Page 44 - Healthy Brain Initiative, State and Local Public Health Partnerships to Address Dementia: The 2018-2023 Road Map

Outcome: Data specific to state and local areas can be
IMPROVED DECISION MAKING USING
STATE AND LOCAL DATA
M-3 Use data gleaned through available
surveillance strategies and other sources
to inform the public health program and
policy response to cognitive health,
impairment, and caregiving.
M-4 Embed evaluation into training and
caregiving support programs to determine
program accessibility, effectiveness,
and impact.
M-5 Estimate the gap between workforce
capacity and anticipated demand for
services to support people with dementia
and their caregivers.
In New York, annual evaluations
help shape and refine an extensive
statewide dementia support initiative.
Learn more on page 52.
38 Healthy Brain Initiative State and Local Public Health Partnerships to Address Dementia: The 2018–2023 Road Map
invaluable in shaping priorities, policies, and programs
tailored to the unique needs in those areas. Past
and current data systems have produced a wealth of
information—much of which has yet to be mined for
public health purposes—to address Alzheimer’s and
other dementias. A few examples are: death certificate
data (particularly before the age of 80), Public Health
Accreditation Board data, livability index data, claims
data from all-payer claims databases, data from
aging networks, health department accreditation
findings, and hospital and community health needs
assessments. Examining these data in new ways with
pertinent public health questions in mind—using, for
example, social network analyses, policy scans, and
economic models—can be revealing and beneficial
in informing actions that can be taken by state health
leadership, legislators, health plans, and more. (A
summary of potential data sources and methods
can be found in the Alzheimer’s Association Needs
Assessment Toolkit, alz.org/publichealth).
Effective public health practice relies on evaluation of
training and programmatic activities to determine what
difference they made—and for whom. Incorporating
evaluation into newly developed and existing efforts
across the care spectrum could be planned during
early design phases in order to adequately assess
quality, reach, and effectiveness. This applies at all
levels of care: healthcare delivery, public health, first