142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

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A Population Health Approach to Early Childhood Development

142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition (November 15 - November 19, 2014): http://www.apha.org/events-and-meetings/annual
Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Lisa Stanley, DrPH , UCLA College of Public Health, UCLA Center for Healthier Children, Families & Communities, Los Angeles, CA
Neal Halfon, MD, MPH , Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
              
There is a renewed interest in improving population health in response to recent research showing that the US is the sickest among rich nations, despite the fact that we spend more than any other nation on health care. This renewed interest has focused attention on the role of measurement in guiding action and accountability for improving population health.  Meanwhile there is mounting evidence for the influence of early childhood experiences and environments on adult health. Despite the potential for improving population health through a focus on early childhood there has been a surprising lack of effort to monitor population trends in early childhood development in the US.

Through an agreement with the Offord Center at the University of Toronto, the UCLA Center for Healthier Children, Families and Communities has established a pioneering effort to measure population-level school readiness in 40 communities across the US using the Early Development Instrument (EDI) as the anchor measures for an early childhood systems improvement initiative called Transforming Early Childhood Community Systems (TECCS).

The TECCS initiative uses geo-mapped EDI data as anchor metrics to guide a comprehensive approach to early childhood community systems transformation. Thus, in addition to the collection and reporting of EDI data, our methodology for addressing population-level child development also includes community coalition building, improvement science techniques, and a collaborative learning network. This opening presentation provides an overview of the EDI, the TECCS initiative, and our development of a national network of participating community partners.

Learning Areas:

Assessment of individual and community needs for health education
Other professions or practice related to public health
Planning of health education strategies, interventions, and programs
Public health or related research
Social and behavioral sciences
Systems thinking models (conceptual and theoretical models), applications related to public health

Learning Objectives:
Compare three citizen-led strategies for prioritizing and mobilizing community organizing and action to enhance developmental foundations for young children. Explain the application of a validated research instrument to assess developmental school readiness by neighborhood and to evaluate the success of community action to improve child development at a population level. Discuss the structure of a partnership of an academic institution with community agencies to apply research to professional practice and citizen action to organize a community’s support for children’s healthy development.

Keyword(s): Community-Based Partnership & Collaboration, Community-Based Research (CBPR)

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: Project Director of a nationally funded CBPR and community mobilization project at 40 sites across the nation aimed at improving children's health and developmental readiness for school success. Doctoral dissertation on integrating community-based public health research and practice.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.

Back to: 5036.1: Innovative community-academic approaches to address healthography