Community Assessment and Planning: A Page from the

Cookbook for Health Equity

Tami Gouveia, Massachusetts Healthy Communities SystemAleya Martin, Greater Boston Center for Healthy Communities

Pat Milano, East Boston Neighborhood Against Substance Abuse

Presented June 21, 2011Healthy Communities Conference

Objectives

• Describe how health equity principles are interwoven throughout a community-based assessment and strategic planning process.

• Identify models that place health disparities central in the assessment and planning process.

• Apply assessment and planning tools that engage community members in the process.

• Describe the planning activities (data collection and small group projects) deployed by a neighborhood coalition.

Health Equity

• Human right to health – achieve one’s life plans

• Goes beyond health care and health access

• Address systemic economic, social, and political inequities

• Goes beyond addressing health inequality in one area, but looking at the system as a whole

• Within and across nationsWorld Health Organization

http://www.who.int/healthsystems/topics/equity/en

Health Equity

Preliminary data for 2008. See Arialdi, M. Miniño, Xu Jiaquan and Kochanek, Kenneth D. “Deaths: Preliminary Data for 2008”. National Vital Statistics Reports, Vol. 59, No. 2, Dec. 9, 2010, i + 71 pp.

Life Expectancy At Birth

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1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000

Life

Exp

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ge)

Year

Black Man

White Man

1900-2000: Changes in Life Expectancy in the United States. http://elderweb.com/node/2838

What is Strategic Planning?

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What is Strategic Planning

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Why Plan?

Strategic Prevention Framework: SAMHSA

Why Plan?

• Ensures that your efforts meet needs of the community and build on strengths

• Helps allocate resources effectively and efficiently

• Helps group stay focused on efforts to achieve success (avoid getting sidetracked)

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Why Plan?

• Helps group articulate its work

• Helps group engage new partners

• Supports group in evaluating its efforts

• Supports group in obtaining funding

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Why Plan?

Structure of Strategic Planning

• Plan out your strategic planning process

• Identify chair/co-chairs to lead 8-12 people who will lead the process

• Include multiple stakeholders from diverse perspectives, linguistic/cultural groups, socio-demographics, etc.

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Components of Strategic Planning

• VMOSA

– Vision, Mission, Objectives, Strategies, Activities

• Theory of Change/Logic model

• Strategic plan

• Action plan

• Evaluation Plan

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VMOSA-E

• Vision

– The dream

• Mission

– The what & why

• Objectives

– How much of what accomplished and by when

– SMART: Specific, Measureable, Achievable, Realistic, Timebound

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VMOSA-E

• Strategies/Strategic Plan

– The how

• Action plan

– What change will happen;

– Who will do what by when to make it happen

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Why Action Planning?

“A picture of important

destinations [that] guides

you on what to look for

on the journey to ensure you are on the right

pathway”

- Annie E. Casey Foundation

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Theory of Change/Logic Model

“If you don't know where you are going, any road will take you there."

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But how will you know if you got there?

VMOSA-E

• Evaluation plan

– Monitor process

– Monitor outcomes

– Share findings

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KIS Principle

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Needs Assessment Definition

A systematic process of gathering information about the current conditions of a targeted area that underlie the “need” for an intervention.

- Getting to Outcomes, RAND, 2004

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Assessment

Needs:

• What is absent or problematic in a community

• Shortcomings

• Things that if you had, would allow you to make better use of your resources

• Short of a source of supply, support, or resource

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Spin definition on its head

Assets:

• Improve quality of the community

• Positive experiences and qualities needed for health

• A person, place, entity

• Synergistic

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Data TriangleArchival Data

Qualitative DataQuantitative Data

Assessment Types

1. Quantitative

- Survey data

2. Qualitative

- Focus groups, Open Space Technology, key informant interviews, observations

3. Archival

- Police, hospital, school data

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Assessment Levels

• Levels

– Establish baseline

• Trends

– Over time

• Patterns

– By age, gender, race/ethnicity

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Prioritize Data into a Statement

• Take into account all data sources

• Take into account perspectives of all stakeholders

• Determine resources available to address needs

Health Impact Assessment

• Ensure that health and health disparities are considered in decision-making using an objective and scientific approach, and engage stakeholders in the process.

• Used to determine intended and unintended consequences of a policy, procedure, or program.

Health Impact Assessment

• Screening

• Scoping

• Assessment

• Recommendations

• Reporting

• Monitoring

Bibliography

• Annie E. Casey Foundation– www.aecf.org/upload/publicationfiles/cc2977k440.pdf

• Community Toolbox– ctb.ku.edu

• Alliance for Nonprofit Management– www.allianceonline.org/FAQ/strategic_planning

• University of Wisconsin – Extension– www.uwex.edu/ces/pdande/evaluation/evallogicmodel.html

• World Health Organization– www.worldhealth.int

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Bibliography

• Health Equity. www.who.int/healthsystems/topics/equity/en/

• Krueger, Richard A. Focus Groups: A Practical Guide for Applied Research.Sage Publications, 2000.

• Simon, Judith Sharken. Conducting Successful Focus Groups. Amherst H Wilder Foundation, 1999.

• Straus, David. How to Make Collaboration work. Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2002.

• Conducting Needs Assessment Surveys. Community Tool Box, 2002. www.ctb.lsi.ukans.edu/tools/en/sub_section_main_1042.htm

• Preliminary data for 2008. See Arialdi, M. Miniño, Xu Jiaquan and Kochanek, Kenneth D. “Deaths: Preliminary Data for 2008”. National Vital Statistics Reports, Vol. 59, No. 2, Dec. 9, 2010, i + 71 pp.

• 1900-2000: Changes in Life Expectancy in the United States. http://elderweb.com/node/2838

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