Jocelyn A. Hirschman, MPH¹, Ami M. Shah, MPH², Abigail Silva, MPH², and Steven Whitman, PhD². (1) Sinai Urban Health Institute, Sinai Health System, California Ave at 15th St., K430, Chicago, IL 60608, 773-257-5329, hirj@sinai.org, (2) Sinai Health System, Sinai Urban Health Institute, California Ave at 15th St., K439, Chicago, IL 60608

Assessments of Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQOL) in communities can assist in identifying vulnerable and underserved populations, motivate groups to act on health-related problems, guide efforts to ensure health resources match the needs of the community, and be used to evaluate public health efforts. Despite the utility of HRQOL information, the routine collection of such data at the local level has yet to be implemented. HRQOL data is available nationwide and by state, but not typically available at the county, city, or community level.

Improving Community Health Survey was implemented face-to-face in six racially/ethnically diverse community areas in Chicago. One goal was to fill this gap in community level knowledge of HRQOL. Data were collected from 1699 randomly selected adults.

The survey revealed excessive disparities in age-adjusted self-rated health between communities. Most significantly, 51% of the adults in a predominately Mexican community reported fair/poor self-rated health, 33% in a NH-Black community, vs. 7% in a NH-White community. Self-rated health and the number of Unhealthy Days were directly related. Those in excellent health reported about 3 Unhealthy Days per month and those in poor health reported 17 Unhealthy Days. Unhealthy Days was also associated with several chronic health conditions including diabetes, obesity, asthma, and depression. Depression was found to be especially burdensome, with an average number of 13 Unhealthy Days.

Our presentation will discuss how measures of HRQOL are useful for health planners and policy makers in assuring that resources are allocated appropriately to communities and that they target health conditions causing the greatest disability.

Learning Objectives: Learning Objectives

At the conclusion of this presentation, the participants in this session will be able to
• define several measures of health-related quality of life that can be included on community health surveys;
• describe the variation and correlates of associated with HRQOL; and
• recognize the utility of such measures for uncovering health disparities, motivating groups to act of health-related problems, and targeting health conditions that cause the greatest disability.

Keywords: Quality of Life, Planning

Related Web page: www.sinai.org/urban/originalresearch/rwj/index.asp

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.

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The 132nd Annual Meeting (November 6-10, 2004) of APHA