From your readings, it is suggested that we as health providers, and, for the purposes of this class health promoters, must ask ourselves why we do what we do.  Philosophically, this question can be answered in terms of why we have a desire to help people live better lives.  Pragmatically, as per Dr. Martin, it has to do with why we choose the type of promotion programming that we do.  Consider in this assignment being able to articulate WHY you would want to take on a certain health promotion or disease prevention project.  Ideally, the key is to take on a project that is justifiable within your community versus taking on a project that you personally think is important regardless of what the community or targeted population perceives or really needs.  As outlined in the readings, it is easy to place energy into an activity that is somewhat successful but that ultimately misses a larger, more important goal.

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For example, a community program that teaches bicycle safety would seem like a worthy undertaking.  However, using information learned in the course, a needs assessment (evidence-based literature review) could show that bicycle injuries were very low in the target community while drowning rates were very high. Thus, efforts aimed at reducing bicycle injuries would be noble but would not be the best allocation of talent and resources.

Therefore, the first assignment of this semester is for you to perform a PRELIMINARY NEEDS ASSESSMENT by performing evidence-based literature review. Once you identify a need, then you can start creating a solution.  This will specifically later on assist you in explaining and justifying what the needs are in your target population. Use the following process to PREPARE to do your needs assessment.

· Review Healthy People 2020 documents and the objectives from 2020 Topics and Objectives (Objectives A–Z) Link: https://www.healthypeople.gov/2020/topics-objectives (Links to an external site.).  Also Table 1-4 (pg. 26) (Course required textbook).

·  Choose a numerical Healthy People 2020  objective with a HEALTH BEHAVIOR CHANGE  FOCUS for your anticipated health promotion/education program (examples include obesity, tobacco use, substance abuse, responsible sex behavior, mental health, injury, violence, immunization).

·  Make sure that the Healthy People 2020 OBJECTIVE and associated HEALTH BEHAVIOR CHANGE  FOCUS is one that you can envision being able to develop into a ready to implement community health promotion intervention with a strong health education component as well as a strong health promotion and empowerment focus.

·  Approvals are not required. However, you if you are considering a health behavior focus for your assignment that is not included in Healthy People’s Objectives, you the professor and obtain approval prior to assignment due date.Preliminary Needs Assessment Assignment

REQUIRED COMPONENTS for Assignment #1: THE PRELIMINARY NEEDS ASSESSMENT (PLEASE READ CAREFULLY)

The assignment should be typed out on a word document in APA format. Each paragraph should consist 5-6 complete sentences. The assignment should consist of 1,500- to 3,000-words (excluding title and reference pages). This assignment must be completed and submitted on a Microsoft word document.  

APA format is required. 12 font size should be used, font names that should be used are Times New Roman or Cambria (not both), normal margins (no more than 1 inch), double spaced, indentation, etc. Please include title page that consist of your name (First and Last), Panther ID number and title of the article (APA format).In addition, include a references page that consist of three (3) references from creditable resources.

Requirements:

·  Document your targeted Objective and your Health Behavior Change Focus. State your chosen health behavior focus and targeted objective from HP 2020 and the Leading Health Indicator it relates to that you intend to address in your health education and program.

2- Document the need for a program related to your targeted objective.   Discuss the rationale or need for your choice to design a program to meet the targeted HP 2020 objective by reporting on the following:  a) Report on the documented health risk(s) associated with not meeting this objective.  b) State ALL of the HEALTH RISKS AND HEALTH CONDITIONS and DISEASES that are associated with the objective’s corresponding maladaptive health behavior. This is to be done by doing an evidence-based literature review using appropriate sources of secondary data.Preliminary Needs Assessment Assignment

Examples of appropriate sources include official statistical databases like National Center for Health Statistics, technical reports, scholarly journal articles and literature review articles. A practical example of this would be to perform a literature review that provides documentation of all pertinent health risks and conditions and diseases that are associated with one of the Healthy People Objective’s that deal with tobacco use, and that describes each of these health risks and diseases (lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease).

3- Report on the incidence and prevalence rates of the health risks and the health conditions and diseases that are associated with your chosen Healthy People 2020/2010 Health Behavior.  Report on any pertinent morbidity rates or mortality rates that are directly linked to your chosen Healthy People 2020 health behavior.  Report any temporal trends of incidence and prevalence rates of the health risks and health conditions and health diseases that are directly linked to your chosen Healthy People 2020 health behavior.  Locate research data and statistics from scholarly literature, trustworthy websites and statistical evidence.  You must provide incidence and prevalence rates on a national level.  Examples of appropriate sources of data include official statistical databases like NCHS and census database at www.census.gov (Links to an external site.), technical reports, scholarly journals and literature review articles). An example of this would be to expound upon the prevalence AND incidence rates AND TRENDS of INCIDENCE AND PREVALENCE RATES of lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease for one of the Healthy People 2020/2010 Tobacco Use Objectives at the national level morbidity and mortality rates associated with lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.  Preliminary Needs Assessment Assignment

4- Report what the research and literature suggests to minimize the risk that is associated with not performing your chosen health behavior change and thus, to meet the Healthy People 2020 objective. This is also to be done by doing an evidence-based literature review using appropriate sources.  Examples of appropriate data sources include evidence base search engines, journals and resources such as Cochrane, Medline, Trip Database, and any other evidence driven journals or resources.  An example would be to search the literature for “evidence-based” methods and programs that have been most effective to accomplish the desired behavior change (like increase physical activity).