The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA

Abstract #54291

Robert W. Prentice, PhD, Partnership for the Public's Health, Public Health Institute, 505 14th Street Suite 810, Oakland, CA 94612, 510-451-8600, bprentice@partnershipPH.org and George R. Flores, MD, MPH, The California Endowment, 906 Vanessa Court, Windsor, CA 95492.

Attention is increasingly being drawn to broad social and environmental determinants of health as they relate to prevention strategies targeting chronic diseases, community health improvement and health disparities. Addressing these determinants poses major organizational challenges to local public health departments, which are most typically funded, staffed and organized around program areas related to communicable disease control, traditional environmental health and maternal/child health. As the Institute of Medicine report on "The Future of the Public's Health in the 21st Century" suggests, public health departments cannot take on this broad view of health alone, but must form partnerships with communities and other public and private agencies to be effective. This presentation summarizes recent research conducted in local public health departments throughout California to determine what administrative and political strategies have been developed to work with communities and other public and private partners to address the broad social and environmental determinants of community health. The research is based on semi-structured interviews with top public health officials in local jurisdictions, and on documents describing public health departments' missions and organizational structures. An analysis of models and strategies to address the broad social and environmental determinants of health will be presented.

Learning Objectives:

• Step 1: Participants will develop a better understanding of the models and strategies adopted by local public health departments to work with communities and other public and private partners to address the broad social and environmental determinants of health.
• Step 2: Participants will be better able to apply models and strategies to their own organizations.
• Step 3: Learning objectives--participants will be able to:
• o Describe organizational models and strategies for addressing the broad social and environmental determinants of health;
• o Define the nature of partnerships with communities and other public and private agencies essential for addressing broad social and environmental determinants of health; and,
• o Analyze administrative and political constraints and opportunities when attempting to adopt organizational innovations.

Keywords: Health Departments, Community Collaboration

Related Web page: www.partnershipPH.org

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.