Conducting a comprehensive community health assessment is an important process that allows local health organizations and municipalities to understand the unique health needs and priorities of the community they serve. The key steps involved in conducting an effective community health assessment include:
Forming a Planning Committee: The first step is to form a planning committee made up of representatives from various community organizations that have a stake in community health. This may include leaders from the local health department, hospitals, community clinics, schools, social service agencies, advocacy groups, businesses, and others. The planning committee will guide the overall assessment process.
Defining the Community: The planning committee must clearly define the geographic boundaries and population that will be included in the assessment. This “community” could be a city, county, multi-county region, neighborhood, or other definable area. Demographic data about the community should be collected.
Identifying Health Issues: The committee researches available local, state, and national health data to get an initial understanding of the major health issues affecting the community. They review things like leading causes of death and illness, chronic disease rates, behavior risk factors, access to care issues, and health disparities. This informs the assessment priorities and questions.
Collecting Primary Data: Primary data is collected directly from community members and stakeholders to understand local perspectives. This often involves conducting key informant interviews with health and social services leaders, as well as holding focus groups with community members and underserved populations. Surveys of the general public and specific groups are also utilized.
Analyzing Secondary Data: Alongside primary data collection, comprehensive secondary data analysis is performed. This involves collecting and analyzing available local health metrics and social/economic indicators from sources like the U.S. Census, Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS), local hospitalization records, and others. Comparisons are made to state/national benchmarks.
Identifying Themes: Once primary and secondary data collection and analysis is complete, the committee examines all findings to identify common themes, priorities, concerns, and health gaps in the community. Statistical differences between population groups related to health outcomes are reviewed.
Prioritizing Issues: Based on the identified themes, the committee prioritizes the three to five most pressing health issues in the community that would benefit from collaborative intervention and resource alignment. These may include things like obesity, substance abuse, mental health problems, access to prenatal care lack of health insurance coverage, etc.
Developing an Action Plan: A detailed strategic action plan is created to outline goals, objectives, and action steps for collectively addressing each of the priority community health issues over the next three to five years. Partnerships and responsibilities are identified. The plan serves as a roadmap for implementing collaborative strategies and evaluating their impact over time.
Disseminating Findings: The full community health assessment and action plan are shared publicly to engage additional community stakeholders and garner support. Findings are presented to governing bodies, healthcare systems, non-profits, businesses, media outlets, and importantly – community members directly. Widespread dissemination of the results raises awareness of priority health issues.
Monitoring Progress: On an annual basis, the planning committee re-convenes to monitor indicator data, evaluate progress of plan strategies, make adjustments as needed, and ensure community health priorities stay relevant based on emerging issues or changes in demographics. Assessment results are useful for applying for grant funding and mobilizing resources aligned with the community’s greatest needs. The assessment process creates an ongoing cycle of collaboration, intervention, and evaluation.
A comprehensive, data-driven community health assessment allows communities to truly understand their unique health profiles, engage residents in priority setting, and facilitate strategic multi-sector collaborations aimed at improving population health over time. The assessment process provides a foundation to systematically address a community’s greatest health challenges.