U N I V E R S I T Y  O F  P I T T S B U R G H

Volume X, Number 1

Interactive Learning Approach to
Community Health Needs Assessment

Ravi Sharma Photo by Joe Kapelewski, CIDDE

Community Health Assessment is a process of gather-ing and analyzing information as well as developing strategies in order to prioritize and respond to the health problems of a community. A team led by Ravi Sharma, Graduate School of Public Health, Department of Behavioral & Community Health Services, recently completed a collaborative assessment of a distressed rural county in northern Pennsylvania. “Working with the community, we discovered a lack of access to dental care, and of course, dental care affects health, employability, and other aspects of life. Additional priorities that the community decided to focus on included reducing the morbidity and mortality rates from heart disease.”

Cooperating with community representatives, Sharma’s team analyzed census data and vital statistics, facilitated focus groups, and interviewed community members with different perspectives. “This is a bottom up, team effort driven by the community. The health priorities identified are the result of a collaborative effort between the community and the researchers.”

For his project, Community Health Needs Assessment: A Problem- and Computer-based Interactive Learning Approach, Sharma intends to develop an interactive, computer-based learning program that teaches students how to administer a community health assessment. Students will get hands-on training from participation in simulations, Web searches, and computing rates and ratios given available data sets.

Sharma, along with a graduate student, will develop the learning modules by drawing on personal expertise in demography, epidemiology, and geographical information systems in addition to his experience assessing communities in southwestern Pennsylvania. The Center for Instructional Development & Distance Education instructional design and technology staff will assist with the project. Sharma believes that actively working with the newer technology tools and data will both inspire and excite students. “This training will be very interactive, relevant, and practical so that it will be easier for the students to retain the information.” Approximately 300 students in public health and nursing from Oakland, Bradford, and Johnstown are expected to benefit from the program.

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