The Lessons and Benefits of Health Equity Impact Assessment

Erika Espinoza, is the Knowledge Exchange Lead for the North Region of Ontario within CAMH's Provincial Systems Support Team. The interview was recorded as part of the Health Equity Impact Assessment (HEIA) Tool Community of Interest with funds from the Evidence Exchange Network (EENet).

Health Equity: Lessons &; Benefits of HEIA from CAMH Education Network on Vimeo.

Two online HIA courses from the Canadian National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy

The Canadian National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy is offering two online HIA courses in English and French:

Online Continuing Education Course – HIA Step by Step

A 12-hour online continuing education course on health impact assessment (HIA) of public policies will be offered by the NCCHPP starting in October 2013.

This online course will focus on the five steps of HIA and will take place over 4 weeks. It will allow you to become familiar with the HIA process applied to public policies, recognize its fundamentals, and think about the favourable conditions for successful HIA implementation.  

Next courses:
In English: March 3 to 28, 2014
In French: May 26 to June 20, 2014

Online University Course – Introduction to Health Impact Assessment

The Université de Montréal is offering a 45-hour online university course on health impact assessment (HIA) of public policies. This course has been developed by the NCCHPP in collaboration with Dr. Richard Massé, associate professor at the Department of social and preventive medicine at the Université de Montréal, and other partners.  

This course, launched in February 2013, aims to help participants to develop and improve their competencies for leading an HIA process relating to public policies, and to do this with partners from different sectors.  

The course takes place over the period of 6 weeks, for 1 graduate-level university credit.
Please note: This course is offered by the Université de Montréal, a francophone university. While the content of the HIA course and the online platform are entirely in English, all administrative tasks regarding this course must be done in French. This includes course registration and payment, retrieving grades and certificates, and asking for technical and administrative assistance.  

Next courses: March 19 to April 30, 2014 in French and May 1 to June 12, 2014 in English. 

More on their website

New HIA reports from the National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy (NCCHPP). These documents are available in both English and in French on the NCCHPP's website:

Planning Knowledge Sharing in the Context of a Health Impact Assessment

http://www.ncchpp.ca/67/new-publications.ccnpps?id_article=950 (en)
http://www.ccnpps.ca/88/Nouvelles_publications.ccnpps?id_article=949 (fr)

Developing a Citizen-Participation Strategy for Health Impact Assessment: Practical Guide

http://www.ncchpp.ca/67/new-publications.ccnpps?id_article=944 (en)
http://www.ccnpps.ca/88/nouvelles-publications.ccnpps?id_article=943 (fr)

The 12th International Conference on Health Impact Assessment (HIA): New issues arising from the evolution of the practice - Summary of Discussions

http://www.ncchpp.ca/67/new-publications.ccnpps?id_article=968 (en)
http://www.ccnpps.ca/88/nouvelles-publications.ccnpps?id_article=967 (fr)

Bulletin politiques publiques et santé, le 7 octobre 2013

de l'Institut national de santé publique du Québec:

Événements

CAN - Health in All Policies. Taking Intersectoral Action for Equitable & Sustainable Health

L'Association de santé publique de la Colombie-Britannique tiendra cette conférence régionale, ainsi qu’une séance avec le Ministère de la Santé sur les priorités émergentes en santé, les 4 et 5 novembre 2013, à Victoria.

US - 141st APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

Le programme de la réunion de l'American Public Health Association aborde les questions actuelles et émergentes en science, politique etpratique de la santé dans le but de prévenir les maladies et promouvoir la santé. L’événement aura lieu du 2 au 6 novembre 2013, à Boston.

Actualités

QC - Investir pour l'avenir : politiques publiques

Ce numéro d’octobre 2013 du bulletin « Investir pour l’avenir » porte sur les politiques publiques. On y présente notamment des outils pour promouvoir les saines habitudes de vie, des évaluations d’impact sur la santé pour soutenir les municipalités en Montérégie, des outils pratiques pour améliorer l’offre alimentaire dans les écoles dans le Centre-du-Québec, etc.

HIA Step by Step - A new online course by the NCCHPP

From the Canadian National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy:

Health Impact Assessment (HIA) is used to inform decision makers about the potential effects of a project, program or policy on the health of a population. HIA of public policies applies to any project, program or policy for which the decision maker is a governmental authority, either at the local, regional, provincial or federal level.

The NCCHPP will offer a new online continuing education course on HIA of public policies starting this fall.

This 12-hour online course will take place over a period of 3 weeks and will be offered both in French and in English.

This course will allow you to become familiar with the HIA process as applied to public policies, recognize its foundations, and reflect on the favorable conditions for successful HIA implementation.

Dates of the online course:

• in French from October 15 to November 1st 2013 
• in English from October 21 to November 8, 2013

Registration deadline: October 7, 2013. Places are limited.

For more information, and to register: click here. (http://www.ncchpp.ca/274/Online_Course.ccnpps?id_article=922) 

For any question concerning this new online course, please contact us at the following address: ncchpp_training@inspq.qc.ca or by phone at 514-864-1600 ext. 3637.

Support HIA Research in East Africa

CIHR Project Page

Kevin Pottie from the University of Ottawa and his colleagues in Canada have submitted a CIHR grant application to support the use of HIA by social entrepreneurs in East Africa. You can support their application by visiting the project page and clicking the like button, which is one of the factors CIHR considers.

Building Health and Equity Into Policy: Health Equity Impact Assessments

Guest post by Dr Bob Gardner, Director of Policy at the Wellesley Institute

Addressing 'wicked' policy and social problems such as systemic health inequities and their underlying social determinants requires comprehensive and coordinated action across government and other sectors -- and that needs good planning.  Health equity impact assessments have been emphasized here in Ontario and in many other jurisdictions as one key way to ensure equity is embedded in planning.

Wellesley has been undertaking more specifically policy orientated angles on health equity impact assessment (HEIA).  When a Commission was established in Ontario to examine the reform of the social assistance system we worked with a broad collaborative of public health, Community Health Centres, hospitals and other health care organizations to provide input.  The theme of our several briefs and meeting with the Commissioners was how to ensure that any reformed system took population health and health equity into account and we set out concrete recommendations on how to create a health enabling system.

We then developed a series of analyses that we explicitly framed as policy-orientated HEIAs.  We called this series the Real Cost of ... because we were often unfortunately arguing that a particular policy or direction would have an adverse and inequitable impact on health, especially for particular vulnerable populations.  These papers dissect the population health implications of the particular policy, review available evidence on the expected impact of implementation, identify health and equity consequences of implementation, and recommend ways to avoid or mitigate that adverse impact.  We have done such Real Cost analyses of:

• proposed Toronto budget cuts to social and community programs;
• federal reductions in health care programs for refugees.  Again, this came out of working with a broad collaboration of researchers, clinicians and community organizations, and we have subsequently set out action steps that various levels of government and providers need to undertake to address the consequences of the federal cuts.  We have also continued to comment as the policy unfolded: for example, when the government released its list of designated safe countries -- which had drastic implications for  the levels of services available to refuges categorized on this list.  We presented to the Toronto Board of Health and to other committees on the health challenges facing refugees and undocumented people.
• Ontario's proposed cuts to a particularly important and flexible social assistance program called Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefits.  This project subsequently led to developing a map-based on-line tracking tool to monitor the social impact of these changes in communities across the province.
• Recent debates on whether a casino should be located in Toronto -- here also, we working collaboratively with public health and other partners, held a forum on the health equity implications of casinos and problem gambling, and presented to the Toronto Board of Health, which recommended not proceeding with a casino.

These policy-orientated HEIAs have proven useful in several ways:

• as a solid analytical tool -- rapidly assessing issues within this framework can quickly provide evidence-based findings and recommendations to effectively intervene in current policy issues;
• these Real Cost HEIAs  have proven to be an important resources for health care and other partners in addressing the particular issues at both policy and program levels;
• they have had some immediate success in contributing to shifts in the particular policies -- for  example, the proposed Toronto budget cuts were significantly softened, the planned CSUMB cuts were reduced, and many municipal councillors and the Toronto Board of Health have opposed a casino in Toronto.  Of course, these analyses were only one part of much wider mobilization that contributed to these changes, but they were arguably an important part.
• finally, by highlighting concretely how population health, the social determinants of health and health equity need to be built into the development of many kinds of policy, across many spheres of government, these HEIAs can contribute to a reframing of how policy is developed -- and can help move towards really implementing comprehensive Health in All Policies approaches.

HIA Conference Quebec 2012: Registration is open

Be among the first to register for the 12th HIA International Conference taking place in Quebec City, Canada from August 29 to 31.

We received nearly 200 proposals for oral presentations and posters from the five continents. This unprecedented interest gives us the opportunity to develop a program to meet your expectations, consistent with previous editions. The preliminary program is available on the Website of the conference: www.hia2012.ca/105/Preliminary_Program.html

In summer, Quebec City takes on a festive atmosphere. Join us! Register by visiting the website of the conference: www.hia2012.ca/98/Online_registration.html

The International Scientific Committee

Health, Not Health Care: Changing the Conversation

It's a few years after the fact but the 2010 Annual Report of the Chief Medical Officer of Health of Ontario to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario is quite interesting and focuses on comprehensive primary health care and intersectoral action for health. It makes specific mention of HIA several times - worth a look.