The health assessment surveys are being reviewed and the results are in

Ivona Coleman, the Community Health Operations Coordinator at the Division of Community Health for the Department of Health in Monroe County, joined Good Morning Keys on KeysTalk 96.9/102.5FM this morning to talk about the county health assessment.

The assessment is very important in helping the community.

Coleman said, “We are very happy and very proud to announce that we have completed our Community Health Assessment. For those who don’t know what community health assessment is, it is basically a comprehensive compilation of data and information that evaluates the overall health status of our community. So it is all about our community and community improvement, and every few years, we have to reassess the status of the community to be able to identify the resources, if there are any changes in that, and also barriers that we could possibly address with all our community partners and improve our community health. So this report, which is now posted on our website for those who are interested in looking into it, this report is a culmination of nine months of work that started in November 2023, and it is compiled of three evidence based assessments. It’s a lot of work, a lot of time that has been invested into this assessment. So that’s why we are so excited it’s all completed, and this assessment is compiled of three different parts, one of them is community partners assessment that evaluated the capacity of local organizations and stakeholders to support public health initiatives. So we basically got all our partners together. We got 30 organizations that participated in the initial partnership survey, and then we had almost 70 different agencies that participated throughout all meetings that we had until August. So 70 agencies, we just have a wonderful community that is willing to work on improvements identifying barriers to services or service delivery, and also identifying the resources that we do have and how we can utilize them. So I would like to take this moment and thank all our partners. We are very grateful for our community partners in Monroe County, for their support and the collaboration and time that they invested into this process.”

There are two more parts of the assessment.

Coleman said, “Another one that we conducted was community context assessment and that employed qualitative data methods, including focus groups and interviews that were held in May and June. These sessions engaged a total of 25 residents. They were just residents that wanted to participate. They were invested in our community, and so we held three different focus groups for them. It was hybrid meetings, so they could join either in person in the Gato building, or if they couldn’t travel that far because it was Monroe County assessment, so other residents maybe lived in Key Largo, they could also join us via Zoom. Again, I can’t thank all the residents enough for taking the time and effort and show up and to voice their opinion and their ideas. Then we had one more that was very important, and we are very proud of this one as well. That was community status assessment. We also call it the well being survey. So with that, we have launched our well being surveys in November 2023 and we stopped sharing and collecting surveys in May 2024. We were able to gather over 1,000 surveys, almost 1,100 valid responses from our residents, that’s a huge number. We are very grateful for everyone who participated, everyone who shared it with friends. There was so many wonderful partners that were just on top of it and sharing on social media, and we can’t thank you all enough.”

What will be done with the information?

Coleman said, “We did these assessments for four main reasons. First of all, the main reason is to find out what Monroe County is doing well and where we have or we can improve in the next four to five years when it comes to health for all residents in Monroe County. The second reason is to create a plan. We need to create a plan. If you want to make any changes, if you want to improve the public health, we need to have a plan to improve the public health, and then, well being. Without a plan, you can’t really make changes. Then the third one is to encourage residents to actively participate, to be part of it, to create a healthier community. The fourth reason is to help maintain the Department of Health Monroe County’s accreditation. So those were our main reasons why we conducted this assessment, and I would like to mention that we did not analyze the results on our own, by ourselves, but we also had help of department the Health Council of South Florida. So together, the Health Council of South Florida and Florida Department of Health in Monroe County and our team, we reviewed the data, and identified cross cutting teams, those teams included healthcare access, chronic disease prevention, community health, community safety, mental health and substance abuse and socioeconomic factors.”

Those are the top health priorities facing Monroe County according to the health assessment summary.

Coleman said, “Those are the priorities that our residents would like to see be addressed and also our partners. So while housing affordability is continuing to be a critical concern in Monroe County, the prioritization process focuses on areas where the health department can have a direct impact. So therefore, while economic challenges like housing are acknowledged in our report, they fall outside the scope of direct public health interventions, and we are focusing on the priorities that we can directly impact. Based on the results of the assessments, we have determined these Monroe County’s public health priorities, and they are, number one, access to Health care, number two, substance abuse and mental health, and number three is community safety. Access to healthcare includes discussions on medic medical care providers and transportation challenges, as well as awareness for preventing chronic diseases. So we would like to focus on preventing chronic diseases like high blood pressure, heart disease, diabetes, and also resources for cancer prevention. 55% of respondents well being surveys reported challenges in accessing health care, with costs, services, availability and transportation being significant barriers. Then in substance abuse and mental health, that includes discussions on suicide prevention, substance abuse treatment, coordination of efforts, getting the knowledge of the services, mapping them out and getting them out to our residents. Mental health issues emerged as a major concern with 33% of respondents citing conditions such as depression and anxiety. Substance abuse remains a significant issue as well, particularly alcohol and drug abuse, with 55% reporting alcohol abuse and 41% identifying drug abuse as a prevalent community problem. So those are quite high numbers, and so that absolutely has to be included. Then we have a very interesting new priority, community safety. So what does that include? What do our residents want? They want us to include bicycle and pedestrian safety, drowning prevention and also human trafficking. So 23% of respondents indicated safety concerns, especially related to pedestrians and cyclists, emphasizing the need for improved infrastructure. We are all going to agree that that’s something that just recently with all the E bikes, and the Florida Keys, our infrastructure is, we’re at the max at the moment, so we’re trying to figure out how we can get everybody to share the roads safely. Another community safety is water safety and drowning prevention. As we know, considering Monroe County’s geography, we are in the middle of the ocean, so we are going to be supporting swim lessons in the county and focusing on water safety and also human trafficking, given the proximity to Miami Dade County.”

For more information, click here:  https://monroe.floridahealth.gov/index.html