Vermont Health Equity Tool
Emergencies exacerbate existing health inequities. Therefore, intentionally and proactively centering equity into your emergency preparedness planning process can help to improve health outcomes for your patients and your organization’s bottom line.
This tool is designed to be used by busy healthcare emergency preparedness personnel who have already completed a Hazard Vulnerability Analysis (HVA) for their organization.
DOWNLOADS
Click the following links to download the latest versions of the Vermont Health Equity Tool, the Toolkit, and the Instructions.
Tool Introduction:
This tool is designed to support a systematic approach to building equity considerations into healthcare emergency preparedness and planning efforts.
This tool is intended to supplement existing emergency preparedness planning efforts, including the use of a traditional Hazard Vulnerability Analysis (HVA) or other risk assessment. It is not meant to supersede any other planning tools or preparedness work; rather it should be used as an additional support to existing resources.
This tool utilizes publicly available data from both the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) and County Health Rankings & Roadmaps (CHR&R), a database created by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute with funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
It is important to note that while this tool identifies specific populations of people (including racial groups), belonging to these groups does not mean an individual is inherently at higher risk. Rather, the historical structures and inequitable systems in place make certain groups of people more likely to experience negative health outcomes during an emergency.