Health care must be evidence based, effective, efficient, and affordable. It must provide resources that meet the needs of the community as a whole. Nurse leaders must understand and thoroughly evaluate the environment to enable the efficient and equitable allocation of resources.
What is a windshield survey? This is a method of gathering information about the status of a community either from a car or by foot. Conditions and trends in that community that could affect the health of the population are noted and the data provides context for making changes and/or improvements.
What is an environmental analysis? This is an examination of the factors that can impact the health of a community, such as air quality, water quality, chemical and/or industrial waste.
What are social determinants of health? These are included as a part of the environmental analysis. There are five domains: economic stability, education quality and accessibility, health care quality and accessibility, neighborhood and built environment (human-made surroundings such as parks, green space, buildings/infrastructure), and social and community context (types of settings in which people engage). [Resource: HealthyPeople2030].
This assessment provides an opportunity to examine the prevailing health conditions in a community by completing a virtual windshield survey and environmental analysis based on communities within the Vila Health System virtual simulation. Although Vila Health is a virtual lab, the communities represented in the simulation are real, enabling you to conduct an actual community health assessment.