Identifying and prioritizing health problems with the community assessment approach in Qazvin province

AbstractBackground: Community health assessment is a process in which researchers achieve a proper understanding of the communityhealth status through the community active participation. The present study was conducted aiming to identify and prioritizehealth problems of Meshkin Tappeh village with people’s direct involvement.Methods: This study was conducted using the community assessment method in Meshkin Tappeh village in the city of BueenZahra, Iran, based on the North Carolina model. One person was selected from each household, and a total of ۲۷۱ people wereentered into the study. The community health assessment process was performed in ۸ stages and problem prioritizing was alsocarried out using Hanlon’s scoring matrix method.Results: At the village level, ۳۲ problems were identified in ۶ areas, including problems related to health area (۳۱.۲%), municipalservices area (۲۱.۸%), educational and cultural area (۱۵.۶%), economic and employment area (۱۲.۵%), social and citizenshiprights area (۱۲.۵%), and security area (۶.۴%). Based on the matrix table scoring criteria, the problem of drug peddlers (۱۵ points),poverty and low income (۱۴ points), dropping out of school (۱۳ points), emergency preparedness in unexpected events (۱۲points), and non-financial support for many health costs (۱۲ points) were identified as ۵ main problems at the village level.Conclusion: In this research, a broad spectrum of social, cultural, economic, and health problems were identified. Although theselected priority for further assessment was allocated to the problem of drug peddlers, solving all these problems requires theconsultation and cooperation of all public institutions and organizations and the people.

Keywords:

Community assessment , community health , Health prioritization