Bexar County gets a health report card
By Raymond Wei, MHA,
CHE for The Health Collaborative
The Health Collaborative has just released Phase I of the 2006 Bexar County Community Health Assessment. The assessment serves as a comprehensive report of local health, guiding the community’s efforts toward prevention and health improvement.
The 2006 assessment is the third in a series of assessments that have been issued by the Health Collaborative every four years since 1998. It is compiled and published as a gift to the community with the understanding that, the more the community knows about its health status, the better able the community will be to take collaborative action to improve it.
The 2006 assessment is being conducted in three phases. The initial phase relies on traditional public health sources, such as vital records of births and deaths, to construct outcome indicators of community health, such as low birth weight and causes of death.
Phase II, to be implemented this summer, will focus on behaviors which influence the health outcomes assessed in Phase I. The emphasis of Phase III is providing the community with the opportunity to have a direct voice in the health assessment process. A report also will be published at the end of Phase II, with a final report on the complete assessment to be published after the first of the year. Reports in each phase and the final summary report will compare the findings for Bexar County with Texas and another large urban area, Harris County.
Here are some of the key findings in Phase I:
Income and Education
The median family incomes of people who live in the north part the county are 75 percent higher than the incomes of people living in south Bexar County. The level of education of residents of south Bexar County is much lower than in the north. Forty percent of the residents living in the south and west sectors have fewer than 12 years of education. Research studies show that health outcomes are worse for people with lower levels of education.
Health Literacy
Understanding how to care for one’s health and how to deal with medications and symptoms is important. People who have trouble understanding the content of a newspaper will have difficulty in understanding the complex issues dealing with health. Community efforts, including the employment of lay health educators or promoters, can help. Also, healthcare providers can reduce the amount of medical terminology and jargon and be more considerate of differences in levels of understanding, whether differences are the result of age, culture or education.
Leading Causes of Death
Safety and Injury: The leading reason for premature death in Bexar County is unintentional injury. Nineteen percent of years of life lost to premature death are the result of vehicle crashes and injuries which occur in the home and in other locations. The people who die due to unintentional injuries tend to be young. On average, an individual who dies of an unintentional injury loses 29 years of life during which he or she might have been a productive member of society.
Vehicle crashes alone account for over one-half of years of life lost to premature unintentional injury deaths in Bexar County. People who die from vehicle crashes lose an average of 34 years of life. This is compared to an average 15 years for those who die prematurely from cancer and 10 years for victims of heart disease. The county would benefit substantially from efforts to reduce unintentional injuries, especially vehicle crash deaths.
The number of people dying from homicide is the thirteenth leading cause of death in Bexar County and results in large losses of years of life with an average of 31 years. Homicides are signals to the community that a much larger problem with violence exists. The community needs to find ways to address violence among its residents.
Heart Health and Cancer: The causes that claim the largest number of lives are heart disease and malignant neoplasms (cancer). These two conditions claim the lives of 48 percent of all residents of Bexar County. Unhealthy behaviors, such as smoking and making uninformed eating choices that lead to obesity, are major factors that contribute to these conditions. Community prevention strategies and interventions that support exercise and healthful eating choices can help to reduce the risk for heart disease and cancer.
Mental Health: The number of people dying from suicide is substantially smaller than heart disease or cancer, but suicide is the 12th leading cause of death in Bexar County. The leading cause of suicide is depression. People who live on incomes lower than the federal poverty guidelines are 50 percent more likely to be depressed. A suicide death is a signal to the community that residents are in distress and need help.
The Baptist Health Foundation, The United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County, the Kronkosky Charitable Foundation and Methodist Healthcare Ministries are funding the assessment. To access the complete Phase I report, visit the Health Collaborative Web site at www.healthcollaborative.net.
Raymond Wei, MHA, CHE, is the president of the board of directors of The Health Collaborative. A cutting-edge, public-private model for solving community health issues, The Health Collaborative began informally in 1997 when several area health care organizations agreed to put aside their competitive business practices to conduct the first community health assessment. The mission of the organization is to improve the health status of the community through collaborative means. Representatives of this group are dedicated to the health and well-being of our community in the spirit of collaboration. Partners include the major health systems in San Antonio, Metro Health, the YMCA of Greater San Antonio, Community First Health Plans, Methodist Healthcare Ministries, and a community representative. For more information, visit www.healthcollaborative.net.
