Open AccessRanking Community Health Status to Stimulate Discussion of Local Public Health Issues: The Wisconsin County Health Rankings
Author(s) -
Paul E. Peppard,
David A. Kindig,
Elizabeth Dranger,
Amanda Jovaag,
Patrick L. Remington
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
american journal of public health
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.284
H-Index - 264
eISSN - 1541-0048
pISSN - 0090-0036
DOI - 10.2105/ajph.2006.092981
Subject(s) - public health , environmental health , ranking (information retrieval) , gerontology , community health , political science , medicine , nursing , computer science , machine learning
United Health Foundation's America's Health Rankings, which ranks the states from "least healthy" to "healthiest," receives wide press coverage and promotes discussion of public health issues. The University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute used the United Health Foundation's model to develop the Wisconsin County Health Rankings ("Health Rankings") from existing county-level data. The institute first released the rankings in 2004. A survey of the Wisconsin county health officers indicated that they intend to use the rankings for needs assessment, program planning, and discussion with county health boards. The institute implemented many of the health officers' suggestions for improvement of the rankings in subsequent editions. The methods employed to create the rankings should be applicable in other states.