The purpose of this assignment is to describe and explore what is known about your selected public health challenge (i.e., “wicked problem”) and the system of focus. The title of the document is your system statement, “The System to Reduce African-American Maternal Mortality Rates in Harris County, TX” .The document should be no more than 1000 words (four pages doubled spaced) and include the items listed below. Students should use and appropriately cite evidence (from the popular press and/or research literature) to support and explain the elements of your issue brief. As a reminder, use the inverted triangle approach to link the broad description of the public health issue to a more focused exploration of it in a specific geographic area and among a specific population of interest.
1. A description of the health consequences of the public health “wicked problem”:
– What are the short-term and long-term impacts of the issue on health outcomes, including health outcomes strongly associated with this public health issue?
– What are the root causes (e.g., upstream social determinants of health factors) that play a causal role in the public health issue in your area of concern?
2. A comparative assessment of the public health magnitude of the health-related issue or system of concern within the last three years, as well as the geographic and sociodemographic patterns:
– How do the measures of occurrence (e.g., increasing or decreasing disease incidence/prevalence, risk) of the public health-related issue compare across the local, state, and federal levels?
– Which parts of the country, state, and area of focus are most impacted? Which populations/sub-populations are most impacted?
3. A description of past approaches to the public health issue/system of focus:
– How do different community partners view the public health issue? What underlying assumptions are prevalent?
– How have organizations/key community partners attempted to solve this public health issue in the past? What systems thinking insights have emerged from past attempts to intervene (i.e., examples of worse before better behavior or “solutions” that address symptoms rather than the underlying problem)?
4.Conclusion
– Given the evidence that is presented in this document, how would you characterize the public health concern and associated health outcomes within your area of concern today?
– How could addressing the public health-related issue or system improve the area of concern or other systems?
