Assessing a Targeted Family applying the MAP-IT steps Glen Williams
Access the areas of greatest need in your community; in this case, assisting your target family to access health care, as well as the resources and other strengths that you can tap into in order to address those areas.
Incorporate the goals of Health People 2010 when feasible.
Overarching Goals * Attain high-quality, longer lives free of preventable disease, disability, injury, and premature death. * Achieve health equity, eliminate disparities, and improve the health of all groups. * Create social and physical environments that promote good health for all. * Promote quality of life, healthy development, and healthy behaviors across all life stages.
INTRODUCTION
The MAP-IT approach is a step-by-step, structured plan devised to tailor one's community needs and improve the health of a community. To increase the quality and years of healthy living for all Americans and to eliminate disparities in health status, individuals and communities must works together to make certain the benefits of health are available to all. There are five steps in the MAP-IT process. The second step in building a healthier community is to assess the greatest needs of the community with the goal determining what you want to improve.
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Assessing a Targeted Family applying the MAP-IT steps
The second step in building a healthier community is to assess the areas of greatest need in your
community. To get a better sense of what you can do, versus what you would like to do, you
will need to take stock of the needs, strengths, and resources in your community. In a family
where the parents (42 year old father and a 40 year old mother) have two children, a 14-year old
son and an 18 year old daughter. They (the parents) are obese, smokers, and have a history of
heavy drug use in their late teen and early adult years. The father has only a high school
education while the mother has a BA in English Literature. Due to their weight, the mother has
diabetes and high blood pressure, and the father has high blood pressure and liver aliments. The
son suffers from asthma while the daughter has had two previous abortions. She may be drug
dependent. The parents are a moderate-low income family with minimal insurance
As a Health Educator your goal is to create a healthy family. A healthy family leads to
healthy community. As a Health Educator, you must assess the greatest needs of the individual
or family. The family mentioned above has many risk factors such as the parent’s years of
obesity and substance abuse which has lead to diabetes, high blood pressure and
liver ailments. Their second hand smoke could be a factor in their son’s asthma. Their daughter
also has issues with risky sexual behaviors. Once the risk factors have been identified assessing
the greatest health need is your next step. An excellent place to start for research purposes is
assessing the top 10 Health Disparities and Top 10 Causes of Death across populations to include
age groups and gender. ("Closer look: Health," may 2012) Of these health disparities the number one cause
of death of Americans 65 or older is heart disease followed by Malignant neoplasm (cancer).
Based on the age of the parents and the fact that the average life expectancy for Americans is
77.6 years, a record high according to the latest statistics from the Centers for Disease Control
Assessing a Targeted Family applying the MAP-IT steps
and Prevention (CDC), you can estimate what the cause of death will be based on the risk
factors. Statistics still show that among African Americans and Caucasians there were record-
high life expectancies: White males - 75.4 years; Black males - 69.2 years; White females - 80.5
years; Black females - 76.1 years. (""deaths: Preliminary data," 2003) A fact that proves healthy
people 2020 overall goals and objectives are working.
Diseases of the heart include various risk factors such as chronic kidney disease,
diabetes, heart disease and stroke, nutrition and weight status, tobacco use. Malignant neoplasm
includes types of cancers and tobacco use. To intervene mitigate or prevent these risk factors
you need help from other agencies and resources. As a Health Educator you must mobilize a
team. An educator must also assess the resources chosen to ensure they are best equipt to help
the family, individual or community. The value of working with strong community-based
organizations should not be underestimated. Local businesses, service organizations, medical
associations, civic groups, faith communities, and community leaders are themselves resources
that should be identified. A major issue facing Americans today is access to healthcare which
makes groups such as these vital to the success of community efforts–because of their access to
the community who they know in the community and financial aspects. These community based
organizations provide many preventive programs to the public such as nutrition and exercise
classes, diabetes, hypertension classes smoking cessation classes. The local governments even
assist with passing local laws such as no smoking in public establishments and taxes on tobacco. Assessing a targeted family applying the MAP-IT steps
Conclusion
Health Educators and community members are able to do remarkable things without
very much money simply by knowing who in the community, who has what resources and what
resources works best based on risk factors. Money doesn’t have to be your only resource. Every
community has a wealth of nonmonetary resources that can be used to address these areas of
concern. Health Educators continue to use the MAP-IT process with great success, especially
how it has been used at the state and local levels, with the focus areas that have been identified as
priorities for Healthy People 2020 and its predecessors, Healthy People 2010 and Healthy People
2000. The overarching goals and meeting the objectives of all will be focal points of discussion
for the remaining modules. ("implementing/assess," feb 2012)
Assessing a targeted family applying the MAP-IT steps
REFERENCES
1. Center for Disease Control, CDC's National Center for Health Statistics. (2003). "deaths: Preliminary data for 2003
2. Healthy people. gov, (may 2012). Closer look: Health disparities. Retrieved from website: http://healthypeople.gov/2020/chart.aspx?raceId=10&ageId=15&genderId=3&race=All races&age=65 years and over&gender=Both
3. (feb 2012). implementing/assess. implementing/assess, Retrieved from http://www.healthypeople.gov/2020
