Community Health Assessment and Improved Public Health Decision-Making: A Propensity Score Matching Approach
This article uses chronic disease prevention activities delivery as a proxy measure of public decision-making and actions. They found that local health agencies implementation of a community health assessment and improvement plan does lead to improved public health decision-making and actions.
Author: Kristina M. Rabarison DrPH, MS, Lava Timsina MPH, and Glen P. Mays PhD, MPH
Publication Date: May 23, 2015
Description: Objectives. We analyzed the likelihood of chronic disease prevention activities delivery, as a proxy measure of public health decision-making and actions, given that local health agencies (LHAs) implemented a community health assessment and improvement plan in their communities.
Methods. Using a propensity score matching approach, we linked data from the 2010 National Association of County and City Health Officials profile of LHAs and the 2010 County Health Rankings to create a statistically matched sample of implementation and comparison LHAs. Implementation LHAs were those that implemented a community health assessment and improvement plan. We estimated the odds of chronic disease prevention activities delivery and the average treatment effect on the treated.
Results. Implementation group LHAs were 2 times as likely (95% confidence interval = 1.60, 2.64) to deliver population-based chronic disease prevention programs than comparison group LHAs. Furthermore, chronic disease prevention activities were more likely to be delivered among implementation group LHAs (6.50–19.02 percentage points higher) than in comparison group LHAs.
Conclusions. Our results signal that routine implementation of a community health assessment and improvement plan in LHAs leads to improved public health decision-making and actions.
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Keywords: community health assessment, decision-making, public health practice
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