Graduate Student Internship Program

2009 Catalog of Internship Opportunities

Comprehensive Community Health Assessment and Report

San Antonio Metropolitan Health District, San Antonio, TX
Skill Area: Data Analysis and Monitoring

Agency Information

The San Antonio Metropolitan Health District (Metro Health) serves as the sole public health agency charged with the responsibility for providing public health leadership and programs in San Antonio, Texas and the unincorporated areas of Bexar County. A multi-cultural community with a current population of 1,320,130, the city of San Antonio, ranks as the seventh largest and the tenth fastest growing city in the country. Located wholly within Bexar County (population 1,489,077), demographically the city’s racial/ethnic background is 59% Hispanic, 37% Non- Hispanic White, 7% African American and 2% other racial/ethnic groups. Metro Health has jurisdiction for public health activities within Bexar County, but operates within the City of San Antonio (CoSA) governmental structure. The Maternal and Child Health Graduate Student Intern (GSI) will be organized in the Metro Health Director’s office under the direction of Assistant Director of Health, Bryan J. Alsip M.D., M.P.H.

This three (3) month learning partnership will provide a GSI with a deeper understanding of community health assessment, the local health system, and issues related to health policy and practice in a diverse community. Working in a team environment, the GSI will revise data collection, analysis, and reporting processes to broaden the "Health Profiles," an annual community health assessment produced by Metro Health. A particular emphasis will be placed on analysis of maternal and child health data including health disparities through the incorporation of social and environmental determinants of health in sub-populations within our community. Such a report will have the capacity to inform Metro Health’s decision-making processes and improve the dissemination of local health data to community leaders, policy makers, and other stakeholders.

Purpose, goals, and objectives of internship

Metro Health works closely with regional research facilities, colleges and universities for public health assessment, research, systems analysis, health policy development, and health program evaluation. While Metro Health compiles, and publishes an annual community health assessment, this report is currently limited in its scope. The “Health Profiles” provides a snapshot of demographics, statistics, and health indicators. The current “Health Profiles” places particular emphasis on maternal and child health data, however, it lacks community analysis components clearly linking social determinants to the local health status and related policy issues. The charge of the GSI will be to expand the scope of the “Health Profiles” to include analysis of health disparities through the incorporation of social and environmental determinants of health in sub-populations within our community.

Purpose: To enhance internal capacity for the capture, analysis, and dissemination of data addressing local health status; historic review and health trends; social justice; social, cultural and environmental determinants of health; and strategies for data dissemination to inform decision making, thus improving the overall health for City of San Antonio residents.

Goal 1: Improve internal processes and expansion of resources for the comprehensive assessment of local health indicators. Objective 1.1 Review and analyze current internal data capture resources and processes. Objective 1.2 Identify additional data resources and processes for incorporation into internal systems. Objective 1.3 Provide guidance and recommendations to enhance the current process, capacity, effectiveness, and expansion of data capture resources and focused strategies.

Goal 2: Expand the scope of the current “Health Profiles” report focusing on maternal and child health to a broad-based presentation of the historical trends, prevailing health status, environmental risk factors, emerging health concerns, and the use of descriptive statistics to initiate discussion of the correlation of social, environmental, and cultural determinants of health. Objective 2.1 Analyze, compare and build a picture of local health status that includes: current health status; health trends; emerging health threats; community analysis; social, cultural and environmental factor influence on health. Objective 2.2 Identify additional resources to aid in the development of a broad-based presentation of data to include quality of life studies, neighborhood and market analysis. Objective 2.3 Define a template for the presentation of the expanded “Health Profiles” to community stakeholders.

Goal 3: Explore historic and current health policies to address emerging health trends and conditions. Identifying community strategies to address and advance discussion and inform decision making process. Objective 3.1 Research “best practices” from comparable communities (size, culture, and environment) in relation to health policy assessment and use of health policy as a tool to improve community health. Develop recommendations with regard to planning, implementation, marketing and outcome evaluation of health policy interventions that could be applied in San Antonio to address the social determinants of health. Objective 3.2 Identify major policies impacting the health status of San Antonio communities and develop a template for linking policy analysis to health indicators that could be expanded in the future.

Data or analytic tasks and activities

The intent of this proposal is to expand the scope of Metro Health’s annual “Health Profiles” by incorporating data and analysis of community quality of life studies, neighborhood market analysis, and community development trends. A sub-set of the proposed project is the identification of “best practices,” research of health policy initiatives for the purpose of comprehensive health planning and informing the decision making process and dissemination of community health priorities.
The GSI will analyze specific data sets, relative risk assessments, program-driven data and community development studies to formulate a comprehensive community health template. The template will utilize descriptive statistics to identify health status, trends, correlation of social determinants and present emerging health risks and potential recommended actions.

Data or analytic skills required

As prerequisite, the ideal GSI should be detail oriented, analytical, and knowledgeable of health indicators and community assessment techniques with the ability to interpret data and formulate conclusions. Knowledge of study design, mathematical modeling, data adjustments, biostatistics and epidemiology would be helpful. An individual with a broad perspective on public health, community planning and an understanding of the influence of social and environmental factors on health would also benefit the proposed project.

Software applications that will be utilized on the learning partnership project include GIS software and statistical applications such as SPSS. The GSI candidate should possess computer competency in the utilization of Microsoft applications including Word, Excel, Access, PowerPoint, Publisher, Front Page and general communication systems.

Supervisors

Primary: Bryan J. Alsip, M.D., M.P.H., Assistant Director of Health

Secondary: Christine Rutherford-Stuart, M.P.H.

Internship begins

Due to the traditional production of Metro Health’s annual Health Profiles for City Council and Community stakeholders, a May-July or June-August internship time frame is most appropriate.

Housing

Assistance can be provided in locating and securing housing.

Transportation

The office will be at the Metro Health Administrative offices which are located with easy access to major highways and are convenient access to all city services. Located in downtown San Antonio, local bus lines are available to and from most parts of the city.

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