Articles & Abstracts

By Mary Anne Morgan, MPH and Jennifer Lifshay, MBA, MPH
Drawing from a decade of experience in a relatively large local health department in California, this paper introduces a conceptual framework for community engagement in public health. It presents the Ladder of Community Participation as a way to illustrate a range of approaches that can be used to engage communities around both traditional and emerging public health issues. This paper highlights real life examples of Contra Costa Health Services' community engagement practices. Based on the lessons learned, it offers suggestions to help other local health departments enhance their own activities.

The New Spectrum of Prevention: A Model for Public Health Practice (145k PDF, 6pp.)

The Spectrum of Prevention is a framework for health departments and community agencies to conceptualize, implement, and coordinate a wide variety of public health programs. This article describes the seven strategies in the Spectrum of Prevention and explains why the Spectrum is particularly appropriate for planning and coordinating programs that address complex community health issues.

Maintaining Effective Community Coalitions (145k PDF, 6pp.)

By Chuck McKetney, PhD and Julie Freestone, MS
For 20 years, community-based health coalitions have been an integral part of the Contra Costa Health Services (CCHS) strategy to improve community health. With two decades of experience and insight and the results of a recent survey from 100 members of 14 coalitions, this report provides useful, practical information on running efficient coalitions, evaluating coalition work and knowing when to end a coalition.

Reducing Health Disparities: Diversity & Cultural and Linguistic Competence (148k PDF, 6pp.)

CCHS has a department-wide goal to reduce health disparities by addressing issues of diversity and linguistic and cultural competence.

Intensive Home Visiting Programs: Implications for California Counties (470k PDF, 7pp.)

A strategy for service delivery needs to fit into the larger social, political, and cultural context of community resources and service programs.

Partnership for the Public's Health (1MB PDF, 6pp.)

Public Health Director Wendel Brunner, MD writes about working with community partners.

Contra Costa County Tackles Chronic Disease (103k PDF, 4pp.)

Health Departments and Communities Mobilize to Prevent Chronic Disease: A Case Study from Contra Costa Health Services (77k PDF, 6pp.)

By Mary Anne Morgan, MPH
This case study describes how the health department shifted its traditional role and began collaborating with several segments of the community to redefine and address chronic disease in a more community-relevant, comprehensive and coordinated manner.

Maternal and Child Health in Contra Costa County: 1991-1999 (344k PDF, 18pp.)

Abstracts

The Healthy Neighborhoods Project: A Local Health Department's Role in Catalyzing Community Development [abstract]

By Galen El-Askari, MPH, Julie Freestone, Chicky Irizarry, Karen L. Kraut, MPH, Susan T. Mashiyama, Mary Anne Morgan, MPH, Sheryl Walton.

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Content provided by the Public Health Division of Contra Costa Health Services.

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