COVID-19 Medical-Religious Partnerships: Implementation of a Just-In-Time COVID-19 Training in Catholic Schools

Panagis Galiatsatos; Alexandria Soybel; Jacqueline Bryan; Vanya Jones; Megan Collins; Kimberly Monson; Mindi B Levin; Audrey Johnson; Alicia Wilson; Annette Campbell Anderson

doi:10.1007/s10943-021-01303-9

COVID-19 Medical-Religious Partnerships: Implementation of a Just-In-Time COVID-19 Training in Catholic Schools

J Relig Health. 2021 Aug;60(4):2362-2370. doi: 10.1007/s10943-021-01303-9. Epub 2021 Jun 8.

Authors

Panagis Galiatsatos^{1

2

3

4}, Alexandria Soybel⁵, Jacqueline Bryan⁶, Vanya Jones⁷, Megan Collins⁸, Kimberly Monson⁹, Mindi B Levin^{7

10}, Audrey Johnson¹¹, Alicia Wilson¹¹, Annette Campbell Anderson¹²

Affiliations

¹ Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Department of Medicine, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA. panagis@jhmi.edu.
² Medicine for the Greater Good, The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA. panagis@jhmi.edu.
³ Office of Diversity, Inclusion, and Health Equity, Johns Hopkins Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA. panagis@jhmi.edu.
⁴ , Baltimore, USA. panagis@jhmi.edu.
⁵ Medicine for the Greater Good, The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA.
⁶ Spelman College, Atlanta, GA, USA.
⁷ Health, Behavior and Society, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA.
⁸ Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA.
⁹ Healthy Community Partnership, Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, Baltimore, MD, USA.
¹⁰ SOURCE, the Community Engagement and Service-Learning Center, Johns Hopkins University Schools of Public Health, Nursing, and Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA.
¹¹ Office for Economic Development, Johns Hopkins University and Johns Hopkins Health System, Baltimore, MD, USA.
¹² Johns Hopkins School of Education, Baltimore, MD, USA.

Abstract

The concept of Just-In-Time Training (JITT) is to provide critical information specific to a public health crisis, allowing individuals to understand and respond to an urgent situation. The design of the JITT curriculum appropriate for school-aged children during the COVID-19 pandemic is vital, as every individual has a role to play in mitigating the spread of SARS-CoV-2. When working with various communities, considering culture and religion is essential, as aligning values and beliefs with the JITT curriculum's objectives may significantly change the community's behavior toward a public health crisis. In this narrative, we describe how a JITT curriculum for the COVID-19 pandemic, created in Maryland, US, and implemented in a Catholic school system, aligned with core Catholic social teachings. This alignment allowed for implementing and delivering the COVID-19 curriculum in Maryland's Archdiocese Catholic school system, culminating in a medical-religious partnership that serves as a model for future public health crises.

Keywords: COVID-19; Community engagement; Medical-scholastic partnerships.

MeSH terms

COVID-19*
Catholicism
Child
Humans
Pandemics*
SARS-CoV-2
Schools