History


Healthy Asian Americans Project also known as HAAP is to improve health status of Asian Americans and to reduce health disparities through research, education, and community seminars. With the help of state representative Alma Wheeler and Amy Seetoo, Dr. Mei-yu Yu started HAAP to help low-income Asian women to get free pap smear and mammogram. The first grant was received from the State of Michigan for BCCCP (Breast and Cervical Cancer Control Program). HAAP subsequently have expanded its service and received more grant from different sources.

 

Mission Statement


The ultimate goal of HAAP is to improve overall health of Asian Americans and reduce health disparities with research, education, and promotion. We want to eliminate health disparities among Asian Americans; including those that occur by gender, race, ethnicity, education, income, disability, geographic location, or sexual orientation. HAAP serves individuals of all ages; we want to increase life expectancy and improve quality of life of Asian Americans.

 

Strategies


HAAP community coordinators recruit participants from their communities and also provide assistance to those that do not speak English but their native languages. We focus on seven Asian communities: Asian Indian, Chinese, Filipino, Hmong, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese. Our health fairs are conducted by collaborating with community-based organizations and agencies. We use various media & channels to educate Asian Americans about health-related topics; we publish articles in several Asian languages in local newspapers, community newsletters, and church bulletins. We also conduct research in order to make interventions to better serve Asian Americans.