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What Type of Data Is Used for a Community Health Assessment?

The University of North Carolina Health Sciences Library defines a community health assessment, sometimes called a community diagnosis, as "a systematic examination of the health status indicators for a given population that is used to identify key problems in a community." Its purpose is to stimulate action that addresses a target community's health needs. Community health assessments employ multiple combined data sources to investigate a wide range of health issues.

  1. Demographic and Socioeconomic Characteristics

    • Demographics are numbers that measure a community's total population and its breakdown by such characteristics as population density, population movements, race/ethnicity, age groups and gender. Demographics are perhaps most helpful in community health assessments when they include socioeconomics, or statistics measuring characteristics like education, income and employment status. Research evidence associates these specific characteristics with health status and health outcomes.

    Vital Statistics

    • Vital statistics come from government-issued documents pertaining to certain important events in community members' lives -- usually births, marriages, divorces and deaths. Some community health assessors, including the New York State Department of Health, treat fetal deaths and induced abortions as vital statistics.

    Health Statistics or Indicators

    • Health statistics, also called health indicators, are numbers that answer specific health policy questions about a target community. For example, a community's annual mortality from tobacco-related diseases could help define the scope of community smoking cessation programs. Mortality, morbidity and incidence statistics for a particular disease are common health indicators. The National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics recommends that community health assessments select a range of indicators based on the World Health Organization definition of health as "a state of complete well-being, physical, social and mental, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity."

    Qualitative Data

    • Community health assessments increasingly use a combination of qualitative and quantitative data. Quantitative data, including demographics, vital statistics and health statistics, are number-based. Qualitative data, on the other hand, capture human meanings and stories pertaining to the research topic. Some common sources of qualitative data are individual interviews, focus groups and literature reviews. Qualitative data can, for example, identify and explore key health themes in the experiences of community members and their own perceptions of their quality of life.

    Data on Historically Neglected Subjects

    • Increasingly, the community health assessment has been expanded to critical but historically neglected topics, including environmental health and reproductive health. Relevant and illuminating information on these subjects can be gathered from the above quantitative and qualitative data sources. This is why AssessNow recommends health indicators reflecting subjects like environmental health and pregnancy, while a manual from the U.S. Agency for International Development presents the uses of qualitative research in upgrading reproductive health programs.

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