298966
Environmental Public Health Tracking: Location-Based Community Profiles
Methods: The workgroup collected feedback from state and local health officials, community-based organizations, hospitals, and other stakeholders to inform the development of community snapshot reports. The stakeholder assessment identified priorities for sub-county data sets. Participating states then used tools like Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to produce such data sets at the zip code or census tract level. For example, Florida used GIS to calculate proximity measures such as the percentage of a zip code’s population that lives within ½ mile (walking distance) of a fast food restaurant.
Results: Eight Tracking grantees will release community environmental health profile reports in 2014. The profile format and content recommendations from the workgroup were intentionally kept flexible, and were permitted to vary depending on state/city health department capacity. For example, some profile reports will be available at the sub-county level (i.e., zip code, census tract), while other reports are limited to the county level.
Conclusions: The goal of this project was to combine environmental and related health measures into community-specific snapshots, building off existing Tracking infrastructure. This workgroup aimed to meet an identified need for sub-county environmental health measures. The resulting community profile reports will be used by local health departments and health councils, local governments, and other stakeholders statewide to assess environmental health factors in their communities.
Learning Areas:
Communication and informaticsEnvironmental health sciences
Epidemiology
Learning Objectives:
Design stakeholder assessments to determine local data needs.
Describe the process for developing environmental health indicators at the county and sub-county levels
Keyword(s): Environmental Health, Geographic Information Systems (GIS)
Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have worked in the CDC-funded Environmental Public Health Tracking Program for over 10 years, and have served as the Program Manager since September 2010. I have extensive experience in assembling and transforming spatial data with Geographic Information Systems for community health assessment activities. One of my primary scientific interests is the use of spatial and statistical tools to create community environmental health profiles, such as those available at http://www.floridatracking.com/HealthTrackFL/CommunityProfileReports.aspx .
Any relevant financial relationships? No
I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.