Community Outreach
Community Benefit Report
Each year we prepare this publication to highlight a sampling of the many
activities we pursue to meet our mission. As a not-for-profit healthcare
organization, our responsibilities to the communities we serve go beyond
providing access to comprehensive and high-quality medical care, although
that, of course, is at the core of our mission.
Download the 2015 Community Benefit Report
Columbia Gorge Regional Community Health Assessment
Collaborating for Optimum Health and Optimized Healthcare
A spirit of collaboration
The organizations listed below have come together to create our first integrated
Columbia Gorge Regional Community Health Assessment. Together, we have
been able to combine social and economic conditions with key healthcare
information to build a prioritized set of needs for the region and identify
unique needs in specific locations or populations.
- Columbia Gorge Health Council
- Hood River County Health Department
- Klickitat Valley Health
- Klickitat Valley Health Department
- Mid-Columbia Center for Living
- Mid-Columbia Medical Center
- North Central Public Health District
- One Community Health
- PacificSource Community Solutions
- Providence Hood River Memorial Hospital
- Skyline Hospital
Historically, needs assessments were conducted separately for various populations
and areas in the Columbia Gorge Region. Local organizations independently
collected and analyzed data and implemented health improvement activities.
As a result, efforts to prioritize needs and to collaborate on health
improvement have been inconsistent and less impactful. This year, we pursued
a different path using the newly formed Columbia Gorge Health Council
with its Consumer Advisory Council as the organizer.
With this new cross-organizational, cross-county forum, we chose to embark
on a collaborative effort to serve the needs of multiple organizations.
Our Principles of Collaboration outline our mutual intentions:
- A collaborative community health assessment (“CHA”) can be
better; more accurate and actionable as community providers agree on the
needs within our region and communities and will support our ability to
address those needs together.
- A collaborative CHA will maximize collective resources available for improving
population health.
- A collaborative CHA must be truly collaborative, requiring financial commitments
from all participants who would use it to satisfy a regulatory requirement.
While Community Health Assessments are often anchored in the healthcare
ecosystem, we elected to be inclusive of the social service agencies and
non-profits that serve the vulnerable populations in our area.
This document that you can download below, represents our collaborative
work and, more importantly, our harmonized voice on the highest needs
for our region overall.