About Us

Our Mission: Partnering with diverse communities to promote health and well-being.

Vision: We envision communities with equitable health care and resources where ALL individuals live healthy and fulfilling lives.

Using a community health worker model, WellShare reduces health disparities by reaching underserved communities to promote health, prevent disease, and increase access to health services. We work with refugee and immigrant communities in Minnesota and with underserved rural populations in East Africa. Our programs address the health needs of individuals across the lifespan – including pregnant women, infants, children, youth, adults, and the elderly.

Our community health workers are trained to provide a range of health services, including the promotion of a tobacco-free lifestyle, nutrition education, prevention and management of chronic diseases, family planning and reproductive health education, promotion of healthy lifestyles among youth, and skills for immigrants/refugees to navigate the U.S. health system.

WellShare is recognized among health systems (domestically and in East Africa) as an expert in the recruitment and training of community health workers. In our 41 year history, we have trained over 6,000 community health workers – an evidence-based approach for reducing health disparities – and our health education materials are used by health providers around the world.

In East Africa, health care providers are nearly nonexistent in rural areas. The community health workers we train and supervise provide culturally appropriate basic health services that reduce mortality, prevent childhood diseases, promote safe, wanted pregnancies, and connect isolated individuals to clinic services as needed.

In Minnesota, our community health workers work primarily with immigrant and refugee populations on the health needs of the community, in addition to connecting these populations to the U.S. health care system. Becoming a community health worker also empowers women (most CHWs are women) for a productive role in the U.S. economy, and is often a stepping stone to more education and training for other careers.