How to Use Data to Support Healthy Aging
Our recent webinar with Megan Wolfe, Senior Policy Development Manager at Trust for America’s Health, was focused on the vital role public health departments play in supporting healthy aging through the Age-Friendly Public Health Systems (AFPHS) Framework.
Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) leads the national Age-Friendly Public Health Systems movement which aims to make healthy aging a core public health function. The discussion emphasized how public health can advocate for and implement systemic changes to address the needs of older adults in our communities.
“This framework, flexible and adaptable, is designed to help health departments at all levels prioritize healthy aging and address the diverse needs of older populations.”
The Age-Friendly Public Health Systems Framework
The AFPHS Framework provides six core components, or the “6 C’s,” to guide public health departments in fostering healthy aging. Megan emphasized how important it is to have strong champions advocating for age-friendly initiatives within communities or state health departments because they can drive systemic change.
Supporting Health Aging
C1 – Creating and Leading Policy, Systems, and Environmental Changes
C2 – Connecting and Convening Multi-Sector Partners
C3 – Coordinating Supports and Services
C4 – Collecting, Analyzing, and Translating Relevant Data
C5 – Communicating Important Health Information
C6 – Complementing Health-Promoting Programs
It is important to reflect older adults and other subpopulations as described in C4 of the AFPHS framework, “Collecting, Analyzing and Translating Relevant Data.” This is how public health agencies and hospital systems can integrate older adults into the Community Health Improvement (CHI) process, ensuring that their unique needs are addressed.
Recognizing that not all jurisdictions have the capacity to collect data on older adults, TFAH, in partnership with the National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO), created the Indicators of Healthy Aging Guide. This guide is designed to help local health departments and partners understand and advance healthy aging through data-driven efforts.
It provides a comprehensive set of indicators and measures that align with publicly available data sources, and it encourages a focus on equity by addressing systems of power, privilege, and oppression that contribute to health disparities.
How Metopio Empowers Data-Driven Community Health Assessments
Metopio’s platform plays a critical role in helping public health departments, hospitals, and other providers across the country access and analyze secondary data. For instance, we curate variables in the indicators of healthy aging for use in assessments and make sure, wherever possible, that age stratifications are included to quickly identify disparities in order to understand the community, including older adults, and redirect resources from data collection to deeper analysis and community engagement.
The platform’s Community Health Assessments (CHA) tool was designed to support the MAPP 2.0 process and provide easy to access, granular data to complete the Community Status assessment so more time can be spent collecting primary data and engaging with the community in the Community Context and Community Partner assessments.
By bringing together both quantitative and qualitative data, Metopio creates a draft report that is ready for review, edit and approval.
Once complete, the platform’s Community Health Improvement Plans (CHIP) tool suggests evidence-based programs from sources like the CDC and allows you to build actionable, measurable plans tailored to their community’s needs, with tools to track progress and align goals across public health and healthcare partners.
By offering these automated processes, Metopio empowers organizations to leverage resources and best practices like TFAH’s Age-Friendly Public Health Systems Framework to create meaningful community health assessments and move from data to action.
Moving Forward with Healthy Aging
The AFPHS framework and the tools provided during the webinar offer a clear roadmap for public health practitioners, nonprofits, and community organizations to promote healthy aging. By leveraging data, fostering partnerships, and advocating for systemic changes, public health departments can create age-friendly communities that support the well-being of older adults and, ultimately, people of all ages.
As we continue to advance healthy aging initiatives, centering equity and social justice in our efforts will be critical to ensuring that older adults receive the care and support they need to thrive. By working together and utilizing the AFPHS framework, public health practitioners can make a lasting impact on the health of older adults and their communities.
Ready to take action in supporting healthy aging?
Discover how data can drive systemic changes and create age-friendly communities with Metopio’s powerful platform. Learn how to integrate the Age-Friendly Public Health Systems Framework into your health assessments and improvement plans today.