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Session Title: Keep an Eye on the Basics: The Importance of Evaluating Public Health Program Infrastructure
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Panel Session 279 to be held in REPUBLIC B on Thursday, Nov 11, 10:55 AM to 12:25 PM
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Sponsored by the Health Evaluation TIG
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| Chair(s): |
| Leslie Fierro, SciMetrika, let6@cdc.gov
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| Abstract:
When presented with evaluation questions about how a public health program is improving population health, many public health practitioners involved in evaluative activities naturally gravitate towards designing an evaluation focused on one or more public health interventions. Despite the potential important contribution of interventions to improving population health, there are many other activities conducted as part of public health programs. High-quality evaluation portfolios of public health programs will include evaluations of partnerships and surveillance efforts intended to provide a solid infrastructure that practitioners can draw upon to plan, implement, evaluate, and sustain interventions. Presenters will discuss collaborative efforts between the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and representatives from state asthma programs to develop and disseminate materials helpful for designing and implementing evaluations focused on infrastructure. State asthma program evaluation experiences will be shared with a special emphasis on how information was used to improve public health practice.
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Evaluation in Support Of High-quality Asthma Partnerships
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| Carlyn Orians, Battelle Memorial Institute, orians@battelle.org
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| Shyanika Wijesinha Rose, Battelle Memorial Institute, rosesw@battelle.org
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| Linda Winges, Battelle Memorial Institute, winges@battelle.org
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| Sarah Gill, Cazador, sgill@cdc.gov
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| Robin Shrestha-Kuwahara, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, rbk5@cdc.gov
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There is a rich literature on the use of partnerships to pursue health goals. Asthma is the type of public health issue for which partnerships are believed to be advantageous due to its high prevalence and the distribution of responsibility for its prevention and management across multiple individuals and organizations. Evaluation is a critical task to strengthen the partnership and help it reach its objectives. To focus potential evaluation designs, we formed a CDC-State workgroup to frame the role of partnerships within State Asthma Programs funded by the Air Pollution & Respiratory Health Branch at CDC, develop evaluation questions, and identify potential indicators and resources. Each partnership concept was linked to one or more indicator and each indicator was linked to one or more method and tool. This presentation will describe the systematic framework and supporting tools designed to promote high-quality evaluations of state asthma program partnerships.
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The Value and Utility of Evaluating Public Health Partnerships: An Example From Utah
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| Rebecca Giles, Utah Department of Health Asthma Program, rgiles@utah.gov
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The Utah Department of Health Asthma Program contracted with the Center for Public Policy & Administration at The University of Utah to evaluate the effectiveness of the Utah Asthma Task Force as a partnership. The evaluation question is: How effective is the Utah Asthma Task Force as a partnership? Answering this involved an analysis of how the partnership is structured, who the members are, what they do, and how the partners work to achieve the goals of the Utah Asthma Program. This presentation reports the results of the evaluation. The findings suggest that in general the partnership is effective in working towards the goals of the state Asthma plan. There are some areas for improvement, and recommendations proposed are reviewed to show progress towards filling those gaps.
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Evaluation as a Program Improvement Tool: Evaluation of Asthma Surveillance Systems
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| Amanda Savage Brown, Cazador, abrown2@cdc.gov
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| Leslie Fierro, SciMetrika, let6@cdc.gov
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| Linda Winges, Battelle Memorial Institute, winges@battelle.org
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Surveillance plays a central and important role in state asthma programs to: help states and their partners design and refine program activities, understand the progression of asthma and its associated risk factors, and generate awareness among key stakeholders about the impact of asthma in their state and how to decrease its burden. Hence, states should evaluate whether asthma is being monitored effectively and efficiently within the state, and whether asthma surveillance activities are leading to intended outcomes. Current CDC guidelines for evaluating surveillance using the CDC Evaluation Framework are best suited to infectious diseases; modifications to this framework are often necessary when evaluating asthma surveillance systems. To assist states, CDC’s Air Pollution and Respiratory Health Branch convened a surveillance evaluation workgroup to generate resources and identify core surveillance indicators. Reference materials to be shared include a logic model, corresponding evaluation questions, and examples of surveillance evaluation tools used by states.
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The Value and Utility of Evaluating Public Health Surveillance: Asthma Mortality Rates Among Seniors in Minnesota
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| Wendy Brunner, Minnesota Department of Health, wendy.brunner@state.mn.us
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When we reported that the asthma mortality rate among seniors in Minnesota was twice the national average, our surveillance advisory group recommended that we conduct a mortality review, based on the difficulty in diagnosing asthma in older persons and the known inaccuracies of death certificates, to see if the trend was real. Over a year, we collected death certificates and medical records for individuals age 55 or older whose deaths had been classified as asthma. An expert panel reviewed each case and determined that only 6% of the deaths were likely due to asthma. Further review of death certificates indicated that 40% of the misclassifications could be attributed to errors in death certificate completion. We now know that asthma mortality rates for seniors in Minnesota are overestimated using our current methods and can take this into account in future public health activities.
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