Health Department to Host Community Health Listening Sessions Across Whatcom County
September 18, 2018
The recently-published 2018 Whatcom County Community Health Assessment revealed that when it comes to health across the county, all things are not equal. To further examine how health and well-being vary amongst the cities and towns within Whatcom County, the health department is hosting a series of community listening sessions to gather input directly from community members about the assets and challenges that are unique to their community’s health.
Listening sessions begin on September 18 and run through mid-October. Dates and times for each session are listed on the health department’s website at http://whatcomcounty.us/2961/Community-Descriptions.
The listening sessions are designed for attendees to interact with health data that is specific to their community and to offer their observations and input about how they experience health every day. “Charts and graphs can tell us a lot about objective measures of the health of a community. But we also need to know the story behind those numbers, and to do that, we need to hear directly from people who know what things in their community are promoting or preventing good health,” says Amy Hockenberry, Health Information and Assessment Supervisor with the health department. “The health concerns that are important to a small, rural community aren’t likely to be the same as ones in a mid-size or larger city. And the presence of health-promoting resources is going to be different in each community as well,” Hockenberry says. “Those kinds of differences are what we want to learn more about.”
The qualitative data gathered at each session will be integrated into place-based health assessment reports to be published by the health department later this fall. The assessments, called Community Descriptions, will be available for residents, organizations, and local governments to use in their community planning and action. Additionally, the Community Descriptions will also inform the countywide Community Health Improvement Plan.
Listening sessions begin on September 18 and run through mid-October. Dates and times for each session are listed on the health department’s website at http://whatcomcounty.us/2961/Community-Descriptions.
The listening sessions are designed for attendees to interact with health data that is specific to their community and to offer their observations and input about how they experience health every day. “Charts and graphs can tell us a lot about objective measures of the health of a community. But we also need to know the story behind those numbers, and to do that, we need to hear directly from people who know what things in their community are promoting or preventing good health,” says Amy Hockenberry, Health Information and Assessment Supervisor with the health department. “The health concerns that are important to a small, rural community aren’t likely to be the same as ones in a mid-size or larger city. And the presence of health-promoting resources is going to be different in each community as well,” Hockenberry says. “Those kinds of differences are what we want to learn more about.”
The qualitative data gathered at each session will be integrated into place-based health assessment reports to be published by the health department later this fall. The assessments, called Community Descriptions, will be available for residents, organizations, and local governments to use in their community planning and action. Additionally, the Community Descriptions will also inform the countywide Community Health Improvement Plan.
