How to Do a Community Health Needs Assessment

Health Data Guru #006: Plus 15 free data resources to start

Today I’m going to tell you how to pull a quick but robust community assessment profile in minutes — and point you toward a narrowed list of data tools I have vetted for ease of use, breadth, and value (so that you don’t have to).

Think community needs assessment is just for tax-exempt hospitals and feel-good policy-making?

Think again.

If you’re unfamiliar with the concept of a Community Health Assessment (also sometimes called a Community Needs Assessment), Addison Van Auken provides a very good qualitative framework here.

Everyone working in health/community has a use case for this kind of analysis and can absolutely benefit from what I’m going to share.

• Payer/managed care/health plan? This can help you identify targeted, strategic programs to address the health needs of a patient population in a region, design new benefits that address community-level determinants of health, expand access to medical care, and develop a new health equity strategy.
• Medical/ancillary provider, community-based organization, or non-profit? This can help you understand the population of people or neighborhoods that you serve, what is most important to them, and where/for what issues they need the most help. It can also help you…