SOAR to Health and Wellness Act of 2015

SOAR to Health and Wellness Act of 2015

This bill directs the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to establish a pilot program, to be known as Stop, Observe, Ask, and Respond to Health and Wellness Training (or SOAR to Health and Wellness Training), to provide training to health care providers and other related providers on human trafficking.

The objectives of the pilot program shall be to provide training to enable such providers to:

• identify potential human trafficking victims;
• implement proper protocols and procedures for working with law enforcement to report and facilitate communication with victims in accordance with all applicable federal, state, local, and tribal requirements;
• implement proper protocols and procedures for referring victims to social or victims service agencies or organizations;
• provide such victims care that is coordinated, victim centered, culturally relevant, comprehensive, evidence based, gender responsive, age appropriate, and trauma informed; and
• consider the potential for integrating such training with existing training programs for victims of domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, stalking, child abuse, child neglect, child maltreatment, and child sexual exploitation.

Functions of the pilot program shall include the functions of the training program that was operating on the day before this Act's enactment and the following authorized initiatives:

• engaging stakeholders, including human trafficking victims and any federal, state, local, or tribal partners, to develop a flexible training module that achieves such pilot program objectives and that adapts to changing needs, settings,and providers;
• making grants available to support training in health care sites that represent diversity in geography, the demographics of the population served, the predominate types of human trafficking cases, and health care provider profiles;
• providing technical assistance for health education programs to implement a nationwide health care protocol, or to develop continuing education training materials, that assist in achieving such objectives;
• developing a strategy to incentivize the utilization of training materials developed under this Act and the implementation of a nationwide health care protocol; and
• developing a reliable methodology for collecting and reporting data on the number of human trafficking victims identified and served in health care settings or other related provider settings.

The program shall terminate on October 1, 2021.

The bill requires HHS, during each of FY2016-FY2020, to collect data on the number of facilities that were operating under the program, and the total number of health care and related providers trained through the program, during such periods.