The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA

Abstract #45051

Richard J. Bogue, PhD, Richard Bogue and Affiliates, 4419 Farmington Avenue, Richton Park, IL 60471, 708-679-0179, rjb@richbogue.com and Claude H. Hall, MA, MHA, Health System Synergies, 26650 W. Lake Rd, Antioch, IL 60002.

Encouraging collaboration for community health is a principal means of putting the public back in public health. But collaborative efforts are uniquely complicated: (a) they are voluntary and lack traditional authority structures, increasing decision making costs; (b) partners’ interests partially overlap, making it difficult to identify specific aims; (c) their budgets depend on temporary sources, producing flux in purposes.

In 1994, Missouri Department of Health, Missouri Hospital Association, and other state partners established CHART (Community Health Assistance Resource Teams). CHART’s mission was “to assist communities to improve the health of Missourians by developing community health plans that provide local access to care and shift a community’s focus from treating illness toward creating a system that promotes, maintains and improves health. This includes a focus on the environmental and social factors that affect health status.” By 2000, over 80 community health coalitions had received CHART’s assistance.

Given the unique complexities of collaboration, traditional evaluation models are difficult to apply, or inappropriate. Complex and novel objects of evaluation call for a naturalistic approach. The CHART evaluation established the frames for data discovery, collection and analysis by developing a Values Framework, describing the core values of CHART, as communicated by CHART. Data were drawn from interviews and surveys.

The presentation reviews the rationale for the use of a values-oriented approach to evaluation, especially for programs encouraging collaboration in multiple sites; describes the methods and findings from the case of CHART; and discusses, with audience assistance, the strengths and weaknesses of this approach.

Learning Objectives:

• Discuss the potential of a Values Framework approach to the evaluation of collaborative community health programs
• Describe an application of this Values Framework approach to evaluation
• Examine strengths and weaknesses of the approach as applied and their implications for the future use of this methodological approach

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.