The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA

4019.0: Tuesday, November 12, 2002 - 8:30 AM

Abstract #40900

Creative Strategies to Evaluate Health Ministries in Faith Communities

Barbara Giloth, DrPH, CHES, Advocate Charitable Foundation, 205 West Touhy Suite 225, Park Ridge, IL 60068, 847/384-3410, barbara.giloth@advocatehealth.com and Kirsten Peachey, MDiv, MSW, Community Ministry, Advocate Health Care, 205 West Touhy, Park Ridge, IL 60068.

While there is a growing appreciation of the role that congregations can play in achievement of health objectives, there has been little evaluation of health initiatives that are rooted in the traditions of the faith communities themselves. The Department of Community Ministry at Advocate Health Care, the largest non-profit faith-based integrated delivery system in the metropolitan Chicago area, has begun to pilot test a variety of strategies for evaluating health ministry programs developed in this context. These include: 1) using an activity tracking log to identify achievement of key milestones in the project action plan; 2) mentoring health ministry volunteers to develop measurable program objectives; and 3) experimenting with a new Journey Mapping tool, an innovative methodology to capture the experience of an individual, a group, an organization, a community or a system as it moves toward accomplishing desired outcomes. Each strategy will be described in terms of its acceptability within a range of faith communities as well as its capacity to provide useful process and outcome evaluation data.

Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of this presentation, participants will be able to

Keywords: Evaluation, Faith Community

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.

Evaluation and Outcomes of Faith-based Health Programs

The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA