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Oxiris Barbot on Healthy Baltimore 2015
For decades Baltimore has been plagued with high rates of serious illnesses such as diabetes, heart disease and HIV/AIDS, and struggled with social problems including unemployment, poverty and violence that often lead to poor health. As a result, Baltimoreans are living too sick and dying too young.
Creating A Resilient Community
Emerging research reveals that communities experience trauma, or adverse experiences, just as individuals do. Symptoms of adverse community experiences manifest itself in a number of ways, including generational poverty among residents, fractured social networks and distrust, and a crumbling infrastructure with increased crime and violence. This month’s webinar introduced participants to...
Possible Community Health Indicators
This tool (from Community Tool Box) describes what community needs and resources are and why, when and how to identify them. It includes a variety of indicators (e.g., children in poverty, unemployment rate), what they are an indicator of (e.g., social environment, prosperity), and potential sources of data (e.g., Census, state employment office).
A Holistic Approach: Making Social Determinants a True Vital Sign
Recently, TEDMED hosted a Google Hangout to examine the impact of poverty on health—specifically how health professionals can incorporate social determinants of health into everyday clinical encounters. To explore this issue, Philadelphia NPR Senior Health Reporter Taunya English moderated a diverse panel of experts including Dr. Yolande Pengetnze of the Parkland Center for...
County Health Rankings Launching Important Community Conversations
The Mississippi River Delta and Alabama Region sprawls across eight U.S. states, encompasses 252 counties and parishes, and is home to more than 10 million people. This region faces significant health challenges such as unemployment, poverty and income inequality, and a lack of access to affordable housing, public transportation, and quality health care.
To help address these...
The Growing Data Toolbox
For almost a decade, the County Health Rankings have shown not everyone has the same opportunity to be healthy — that counties right next to each other can provide drastically different opportunities for health and well-being. The county-level data that explores health factors such as access to healthy foods, rates of smoking, and children living in poverty coupled with the rich collection of...
Using Available Data to Understand the Health of Racialized Groups of People
Community Safety Measurement Strategies
Community safety is often measured using the levels of violence and injuries experienced by the population. There are several mechanisms in which to characterize...
How a Low Ranking on Health Mobilized Wyandotte County
When Wyandotte County, Kansas finished dead last in a 2009 health rankings study, Mayor Joe Reardon wanted some answers. The Kansas County Health Rankings showed that Wyandotte County, which includes Kansas City, was the least healthy of 105 counties in the state. The study looked at multiple factors that affect health, including behaviors like smoking, factors in the environment like clean air, access to care, and socio-economic factors like poverty.