IHEA initiates dialogue on culturally sensitive health issues through the following methods:

Dialectical Discussion
Health problems of each community can differ drastically. African American men suffer from a high rate of prostate cancer, while the Hmong are frequent victims of kidney ailments. IHEA presents statistics to bring awareness to community leaders and then diplomatically encourages them to participate in sharing of information and brain storming for solutions. Such meetings, when successful, can be rich sources of research data and powerful windows into the culture's concepts of health and disease.

Lectures through Interpreters
Live translated lectures take more time, but they can be indispensable to the new immigrant who in turn takes the information to others within the invisible coccoons of their communities. Such lectures aid both the uneducated and the professional, educated immigrants. The latter group learns how to communicate health issues to the less educated members of their communities.

Workshops
Workshop are more effective if they are arranged based the participant's lifestyles. For instance, IHEA learned that Somali women prefer to learn about breast self-exam in the intimacy of their own homes, sitting on the floor, and having Somali tea.

Informal settings can be highly effective. IHEA taught Guatemalan illiterate women about nutrition and immunization while cooking in a kitchen. Or we taught about skin cancer and protection by sponsoring an informal workshop on cosmetics.

Poster Presentations
We use a culture's own images, symbols, favorite colors, proverbs, music, poems and other native art to present otherwise strange-sounding ideas. For instance, the concept of disease prevention-something alien to some Third World subcultures-can be explained through stories presented by a live person or on recorded tape.