Community Health Improvement Week: Highlighting The Center’s Engagement to Improve Community Health | $name

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Community Health Improvement Week: Highlighting The Center’s Engagement to Improve Community Health

Thu, Jun 13, 2024  -  Comments (0)  -   Posted by The Center for Health Affairs

Community Health Improvement week is upon us, but what exactly does it entail? This week is designated to be a time to recognize the people and organizations working in partnership to improve the health and well-being of individuals and communities and advance health equity.

Founded by the American Hospital Association’s (AHA) Community Health Improvement Network, Community Health Improvement Week occurs June 10 – 14, 2024. This annual celebration of the people who improve the health and well-being of our community is a chance to highlight initiatives and achievements and honor hospitals, health systems and community organizations partnering to boost population health.

If you’re looking for tips on how to celebrate the week before it ends by sharing on social media, AHA’s #CHIWeek Digital Engagement Toolkit can be found here.

For The Center of Health Affairs, the idea of improving community health is part of its core mission. These are just a few of the programs The Center has devoted its time and resources to in an effort to improve community health:

The Northeast Ohio Opioid Consortium

The United States continues to be impacted by the opioid crisis. Here in Northeast Ohio, hospitals, law enforcement and mental health providers continue to face the many challenges of the epidemic.

A partnership between The Center, areas hospitals, providers and community health programs, the Opioid Consortium aims to mitigate the opioid crisis through their strategic plan, which includes education of hospital employees across the healthcare continuum, use of medication-assisted treatment, and expanded distribution and use of naloxone.

The Opioid Consortium membership works collaboratively to address region’s opioid crisis by sharing and implementing evidence-based practices, promoting policy changes and increasing prevention efforts. You can learn more at neohospitals.org.

The SDoH Innovation Hub

In 2022, the Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) Innovation Hub was formed with a three-year agreement with Amazon Web Services to address the root causes of health disparities. Built to ingest data and strategize solutions, the SDoH Hub operates under the guidance of community residents, nonprofits and the public and private sectors to identify and implement solutions through measurable outcomes, research and analytics.

The first area of focus was on addressing firearm-related deaths in Cleveland. Collected and analyzed from more than 50 publicly available sources, the data revealed that nearly 60% of suicides in Northeast Ohio are from firearms. In contrast, the national average is 50%. The analysis revealed a correlation between fire-related suicides and factors including housing insecurity, lack of transportation and unemployment.

Focusing on improving the health of the community, interventions will be developed for the three zip codes in Cleveland with the highest rates of firearm suicides. The Center will collaborate with partner organizations to develop policies and programs that can improve the issues of unemployment, transportation and housing insecurity.

Cuyahoga County CHNA

The Center for Health Affairs partnered with the Cuyahoga County Board of Health (CCBH) to develop a joint community health needs assessment (CHNA). This initiative brought together member hospitals, public health, community stakeholders and community residents to develop the assessment.

The information gathered is vital to truly understand the health concerns of the community. The 2022 Cuyahoga County CHNA identified three priority areas:

  • Behavioral Health (Mental Health & Drug Use/Misuse)
  • Accessible and Affordable Healthcare
  • Community Conditions (Access to Healthy Food & Community Safety)

These three areas of focus will inform the design of the community health improvement plan and implementation strategies for 2023-2025 that is currently underway by CCBH. You can view the full report, here.

HealthyNEO

Developed in partnership with the Cuyahoga County Board of Health, the Healthy Northeast Ohio website offers hospitals, public health departments, community-based organizations and other stakeholders with data and resources to assist regional and community health improvement activities and strengthen collaboration.

The Healthy NEO site consists of features that allows users to:

  • View 300 demographics variables available at the state, county and zip code levels
  • Examine zip-code level maps of socioeconomic need
  • Access more than 275 health and quality of life data indicators
  • Map and visualize data, and generate tailored data reports
  • Access county-specific pages with local data, priorities and health improvement strategies and resources

To learn more, visit healthyneo.org.

How can you celebrate Community Health Improvement Week?

Community Health Improvement week is a perfect time to highlight your organization’s commitment to community improvement and recognize individuals and partners seeking to make our neighborhoods a healthier place to live, work, play, and pray. Whether you work in population health, community health or at a hospital, health system or other community organization, you can celebrate the week by using #chiweek on social media.

Posted in Population Health
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