Merced County seeks community input for five-year plan to improve public health

A new community health assessment for Merced County paints a bleak picture: Two out of three children live in poverty; one out of four children are obese; about one-third of residents 25 years and older do not have a high school diploma; and the county as a whole has a shortage of health professionals.

Based on the findings in the assessment, residents concluded that the various health issues plaguing the community are interrelated and reflect one another.

“Having one health condition increases the risk of getting another health issue,” said Kristynn Sullivan, epidemiologist and accreditation coordinator for Merced County. “It’s not the genetic code, it’s actually where they live. It’s the ZIP code.”

The Merced County Department of Public Health compiled data for the report, the Merced County 2016 Community Health Assessment, with the help of an Oakland-based consulting firm, Resource Development Associates.

Residents at a community health meeting Thursday night discussed the top health concerns noted in the assessment, such as the risk of heart disease and strokes, the impact of poverty, and the lack of education and access to healthy foods.

Sullivan and Alison Hamburg, program associate for Resource Development Associates, said research shows the main factor of having a healthy community and life is the surrounding environment, such as having safe places to exercise or play and adequate housing.

“All of these things affect our overall physical and mental health,” Hamburg said. “It’s not just medical issues but social issues that affect our health.”

The top issue, and the leading cause of death in the county, is heart disease, a condition that can be managed or avoided by lifestyle changes, according to the report.

“People can take steps to prevent these measures,” UC Merced student Christopher Bernal said. “If we’re teaching students how to be healthy, they will develop those habits for their whole life.”

Although deaths due to heart disease have been declining in Merced County, the numbers have been above the state and country average for the past 10 years, the report said.

Bernal, a management and business major from Lancaster, said instilling healthy habits in children has the potential to change their health outcomes, hopefully beating the chances of contracting heart disease or diabetes.

Lack of medical providers can create medical care barriers for residents, the assessment said, such as long wait times for appointments, lack of preventive care and poor management of chronic diseases, like diabetes or asthma.

There are 2,334 patients for every primary care physician, according to the report.

During the meeting, members of the community spoke out on the problems of not having enough primary care physicians in Merced and how long wait times for scheduling appointments or to be seen by a doctor can contribute to health issues in the community, especially for preventable diseases.

Community members discussed how some residents don’t have easy access to a grocery store, and are surrounded by liquor stores filled with foods high in sugar and fat.

“All of these those things really directly impact whether or not you will develop a health issue or actual disease,” Sullivan said.

Through the assessment, the Public Health Department will develop a five-year improvement plan set to be ready by spring 2017, Sullivan said.

The Department of Public Health has been taking steps over the last few years to become an accredited health department. Compiling the report was part of the process.

“It helps us identify where places need help and what is going well,” Sullivan said.

The Department of Public Health is having 15 meetings throughout the county to reach out to community members and figure out what they want to see changed and their ideas of how to do it.

Sullivan said they are compiling all the input they gathered from every community to create the five-year plan. She said they have not yet discussed the next steps to making the plan.

“There’s a lot of opportunities to improve things for children,” Sullivan said. “I think, if we can intervene on that level, it would be beneficial.”

This story was originally published July 29, 2016 at 6:23 PM with the headline "Merced County seeks community input for five-year plan to improve public health."