Articles Women of Inspiration™ Spotlight – Julissa Soto
2024 Women of Inspiration™ Spotlight Feature – Julissa Soto, Julissa Soto Latino Health Equity Consulting
Julissa Soto stands at the forefront of the movement for Latino health equity, a beacon of empowerment and change dedicated to positive visibility. Through her advisory, Julissa Soto Latino Health Equity Consulting, she extends her influence from Colorado on a nationwide and global scale. Soto has trained over 5,000 health providers and presented to 10,000 healthcare professionals across 117 countries on the “Power of Cultural Validation. Julissa Soto has been a force of change, leading the charge for Latino immigrant equality, inclusion, and health equity in Colorado and across the entire world. From her roots in teen parent programs to her pivotal role on the Colorado Vaccine Equity Task Force to advocacy for health equity at the American Diabetes Association, Soto has relentlessly pioneered programs aimed at empowering marginalized communities. Julissa Soto’s journey embodies the power of advocacy and the transformative potential of disrupting the status quo.
Definition of a Woman of Inspiration
A woman of inspiration to me means someone who helps those less fortunate or less privileged than her. That woman strives to give hope to women who feel oppressed and misrepresented because of their culture, ethnic background or where they live in the world. She inspires and motivates others to be caring and giving this way. She promotes opportunities to demonstrate love in action.
What it feels like to be recognized:
My goal is to inspire women all over the world. For the marginalized: to see that despite where they come from or whatever culture is their roots or what privilege they may lack, they have dignity and deserve respect. They should have opportunities to accomplish and succeed beyond any expectations others may have for them. For the privileged: To help open those doors of accomplishment and success for those less privileged. If I am recognized as a woman of inspiration this way, I’ll be humbled and honored to know that I am on the right path to achieve that goal.
Tell us about your SupportHERs:
I’m grateful for the health and community leaders who recognize how critical dedicated frontline work is and make my job so much easier. People like:
Jill Hunsaker Ryan of Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment,
Kim Bimestefer of Colorado’s Department of Health Care Policy and Financing,
Annie Lee, of Colorado Access Colorado Governor Jared Polis who in 2021 honored me proclaiming September 20th as “Julissa Soto Day” because of my work in health. I’m grateful for top leaders in county health departments who’ve supported Cultural Validation in health clinics. And especially the grass root volunteers who make it happen. At a Denver church Vaccine Sunday in May 2024 they came: Public Health Institute at Denver Health, Denver Catholic Medical Association, CAHEP, Colorado Access, Immunize Colorado, and then the promotoras, student volunteers from Rocky Vista University, Platt College, Anschutz Medical campus and a ton of regional health/CBO organizations. Thank you.
Julissa’s Definition of Success
Success is when you can see people, especially women, giving back to their communities motivated by love and caring for others. Success means seeing the willingness of others to share their wealth, talent, intellect, resources and faith. Success is the gratification I feel when I know I had a part helping this to happen.
My Story
Twenty-five years ago, I tried to get healthcare support for myself and my sick kids. I struggled with roadblock after roadblock to access care. I was very new to the country, undocumented, a single mom seriously injured by domestic violence. I didn’t know English nor anything about our health systems.
I discovered the health system was not only incomprehensible to me but also to most of my Latino neighbors, even those who were documented. We were all scared about our families’ health. I realized our health system was not designed to be understood by anyone, much less the community that it should serve. I promised God then that I would one day try to figure out this health system and then be there to
help others understand and access it.
I had to start small, with lower-paying jobs, but I was determined to learn as much as I could. I knew with that promise I made I must be a constant learner. I began to work my way up the ladder of experience, taking on more responsibilities. I learned English well enough to land a job with the county helping others and then branched out into mental health and youth violence and suicide prevention work. Continuing with
school and getting my masters, I worked with the American Diabetes Association in diabetes prevention,
focusing especially on immigrants.
My work in health verified over and over how our health system fails to do its job in the communities of color that have been mistreated and abused by systems.
These failures became evident during the pandemic when the health system’s massive immunization campaigns missed Latinos, over 20% of the nation and its largest ethnic minority. By the end of 2022, barely 50% of Latinos in Colorado and other states had received COVID-19 immunizations. Yet over 70% of non-Latinos had been vaccinated. The result: Latinos have the highest hospitalization rates and death rates from COVID-19.
It was obvious. Health systems didn’t know what to do. When mobile immunization teams went into Latino communities, turnouts were insignificant, maybe a dozen or two if that. Health leaders dismissed the low numbers as “vaccine hesitancy” but did not take measures to understand why.
From my years by then working on health issues, I knew the failure of health systems to vaccinate Latinos didn’t come from hesitancy but from barriers to access, and that new strategies could make a difference, not only for COVID-19 but for childhood vaccinations where Latino children were also woefully under vaccinated.
In the old paradigm, we built brick and mortar low-income clinics, and by passing out some fliers in translated Spanish, thought Latinos would come. They didn’t.
In the old paradigm we set up mobile vaccination clinics on weekdays 10:00 am to 3:00 pm when Latinos were working or busy, passed out some fliers again, sat behind tables distant from the community, and expected people to come. They didn’t come.
We needed a new paradigm. I began to test a new approach: Go to Latinos in their communities at date and times, including weekends, when they are available. Authentically engage them, face to face. Transcreate fliers (not translate them) to be relatable to the people. Make clinics fun, “vaccine parties” instead of bland “vaccine clinics”. For children, bring brightly colored vans and include providers in superhero costumes. Demonstrate through cultural validation that the health community genuinely cares for them.
Working with health department vaccinators, I called these programs “Vacunas en su Casa”, “Vaccine Sundays”, “One School One Vaccine at a Time”, with transcreated outreach focusing on locations where Latinos are and when they are available: businesses, shopping centers, hair salons, churches, community events, schools.
At these events under the new Cultural Validation paradigm, instead of a dozen showing up, hundreds would. At some Covid-19 events during the pandemic even a thousand would line up.
As a result since Fall of 2021, this new and evolving paradigm of cultural validation has vaccinated over 30,000 Latino adults, youth, and children to combat COVID-19 and other serious adult and childhood diseases, just in Colorado, distributing over 180K Covid-19 test kits and 90K masks making critical differences in lives of countless individuals.
Changing the status quo with the new paradigm for a health system locked into the old ways wasn’t easy of course. But I hold health system decision makers accountable to the communities they serve (cage rattling when necessary). Either implement Cultural Validation in your clinics or show a better way that works. Seeing the results in the Latino community when barriers are lowered through cultural validation,
health system leaders are coming around. Cultural Validation programs are not only for American Latinos but for any cultural minority in any
country. See the presentation I gave in Paris, France in June 2024: https://infectiouscongress.com/program/scientific-program/2024/the-power-of-cultural-validation-a-global-innovative-strategy-when-working-with-vaccines
To date I’ve trained over 5000 health providers in Cultural Validation, taking the message of change and the new paradigm of health to over 30 US states and 5 countries now. It’s been a long journey for me as a young undocumented Latina 25 years ago, then a victim of a health system that I couldn’t trust, to the leader today advocating for robust health systems to do a better job protecting the health of the marginalized. I’m still on the trail, fulfilling the promise I made to God and paying forward my good fortunes since then to inspire the health system community to address the
barriers that keep so many people distant from health care.
In this work, I collaborate mostly with community women as well as women working in public health and other medical disciplines. I can’t do this work without them. Sometimes the public health women, used to the old ways, find the changes of Cultural Validation in their practices challenging. Until they try the changes and see the responses from the community they serve. I’m gratified that I can inspire these women to open new doors of health to become the leaders themselves in reinventing a health system that will equitably serve everyone.
