ARTHRITIS, OSTEOPOROSIS, AND CHRONIC BACK CONDITIONS

Healthy People Consortium Meeting
"Implementing Healthy People 2010"
November 11, 2000

Summary of Breakout Group Discussion Concerning:
Arthritis, Osteoporosis, and Chronic Back Conditions

1. What does implementing Healthy People 2010 mean to you?

Tracking data on Arthritis, Osteoporosis, and Chronic Back Conditions so that information is sufficient and up to date.
Creating databases about these health topics.
Allocating resources to specific areas of need (most important toward data collection and tracking)
Increasing visibility: making the general public aware of what arthritis, osteoporosis, and chronic back conditions are and how they can be prevented and treated.
Agencies, organizations, and other groups taking responsibility for making a difference in these health issues and implementing Healthy People 2010.
Increasing interagency work to combine resources, information, and strategic efforts and cut down overlaps.
Increasing education and awareness through increasing amount of information available to general public and increasing programs teaching prevention of these conditions.
Expanding traditional partnerships to include other types of organizations.

2. How do you suggest we work with local community groups in implementing the Healthy People 2010 objectives?

Collect and track more data at the local level.
Expand partnerships and work with lots of organizations such as faith-based organizations, senior groups, and physician assistant groups.
Work with directors of other chronic disease organizations and groups to find out what methods they are using to educate the public, form partnerships, collect data, and receive funding.
Evaluate AHRQ research information on arthritis, osteoporosis, and chronic back conditions for recommendations on what information and methods to focus on in order to deal with these conditions.
Establish models for how to treat each of these conditions. The models and treatments methods should not be defined by specific professions.
Communities can adopt a Healthy People 2010 objective.

3. What are the challenges/barriers to meeting the Healthy People 2010 objectives? And how do you suggest we work to overcome them?

Not enough funding. CDC, especially National Center for Health Statistics needs more funding to track accurately and compile sufficient data.
Agencies, government organizations, and other groups not working together.
Not enough education and programs dealing with understanding the issues of arthritis, osteoporosis, and chronic back conditions.
Organizations, government, and communities not taking responsibility for educating, informing, and working together to provide improvements in these health areas.
Not having sufficient data (particularly local data).
Making sure that we track the data so that they are always up to date.
Need for evidence-based information.
Access to education (literacy, technological barriers).
Need for proper and best-practice information.
Need for leaders in Congress who recognize issues of arthritis, osteoporosis, back conditions, and other public health concerns to take a stand in improving health.
Systematic barriers such as physician time constraints and lack of investment in preventive measures.
Difficulty of making these issues exciting because they are not life threatening.
The focus of the health care system is still treatment and not prevention.

How do we overcome these barriers?

Figure out where the power lies with policymakers and make sure to get accurate data to them.
Collect and track more data on specific aspects of the conditions to be included in Healthy People. For example, there are no data on hip fractures as a result of osteoporosis.
Make sure data are accurate and complete.
Work to inform media of what is the accurate scientific data to relay the exact issues to the public.
Work toward delivering information in such a way that is appealing to the media and not overwhelmingly scientific.
Deliver preventive information to providers.
Look to AHRQ for preventive measures and screening methods. Deliver this information to providers and physicians.
Define and have standards for terminology for conditions and diseases and treatments. Make sure that all racial and ethnic groups are included and that there are specific definitions for each.
Pull together private-sector partners. Work together to balance everyone's objectives.
Work with other agencies and organizations to try and eliminate duplicated efforts to increase funding for other areas of need.
Have instructional programs on how to interpret complex data involving all disparities.
Have providers and clinicians properly instructed on how to interpret data from machines used in these chronic conditions and also understand the data to measure progress.

4. What can we do to support the elimination of health disparities among racial and ethnic population groups?

Make sure there are sufficient data for all types of disparities.
Define what the disparities are.
Make sure there are data for every ethnic and racial group at risk for these conditions, not just the most at risk.
Increase access to care.

5. How do we measure progress of Healthy People 2010 in the future? And what is progress?

By having accurate and comprehensive data.
Measure progress by tracking the data and making sure that we are closer to the target.

6. How can we work more effectively with the media in implementing the Healthy People 2010 objectives?

Focus on issues that aren't only on preventing death but on improving the quality of life.
Get information into local newspapers.
Have local physicians and other respected members of the medical community write in the papers.
Get information out to local radio broadcasts.
If proper resources are acquired, a national ad campaign could be established.
Give recognition to groups or journalists who responsibly report information.
Prepare media with already processed information, ready for them to use.
Develop long-term relationships with media at the local level.

List the strategies and specific steps discussed in your group.

Strategies that need to be resolved
Data issues
Resource issues
Increasing information in Healthy People about arthritis, osteoporosis, and chronic back conditions.

Participant List

Facilitator: Charles Helmick
Recorder: Mandy Edwards

Johanna Hinman
Arthritis Foundation
jhinman@arthritis.org

Kathleen Turczyn
CDC/NCHS
kturczyn@cdc.gov

Paul Scherr
CDC/NCCDPHP
pas0@cdc.gov