Pella Regional takes stock, solicits community feedback for three-year plan

Sep. 26—PELLA — Community members met at Pella Regional Hospital to analyze a Community Health Needs Assessment and pinpoint top priorities for healthcare in Pella moving forward as they work toward a new improvement plan.

The presentation was led by Sarah Pavelka, a health administration expert with Pavelka's Point Consulting, LLC. The needs assessment, which was gathered from an individual consumer-based survey and included data from across Marion County, received a statistically significant rate of response from the community and analyzed everything from social determinants of health to perceptions of health and services.

Pavelka says Pella Regional has been doing the health needs assessment for "several years now," and that it goes on a three-year cycle.

"This is bigger than just the hospital," Pavelka says. "It is really looking at the community across the spectrum, not just the services that happen at the hospital, or even at the public health, but really what is the health — and we're going to broadly define health, because health of a community could be the healthcare services, but it also could be the health of the education system, could be the health of the employment opportunities, could be the public safety health — of our communities in which Pella Regional serves, bigger than just the hospital services."

Based on data from the previous health needs assessment, mental health is still a top need in Marion County. Pavelka says that mental health is not a unique problem for the county but is a nationwide need that she predicts will continue to grow. General improvement has occurred, according to a combination of data from the survey, countyhealthrankings.org and other sources, in preventable hospital stays, premature births and preventative screenings.

According to current data, Marion County is ranked number 17 in the state for the health outcomes as of 2023, according to countyhealthrankings.org.

"That's really good," Pavelka says. "Anytime you're kind of in that top quartile [is good]."

The health outcomes category includes premature death, poor or failing health, physical health, mental health and more. The data is from all of Marion County and cannot be split up between the Pella and Knoxville hospitals, though each does their own health needs assessment.

Premature death, in particular, is trending in a positive direction for Marion County, meaning that fewer years are being lost for people under the age of 75.

For health factors, Marion County is ranked number nine in the state, a statistic that Pavelka is enthusiastic about.

Areas of concern include a rate of 56% motor vehicle deaths being alcohol-impaired driving deaths, compared to the state and national rates, which are both 27%. Pavelka attributes part of that statistic to the high number of people that commute to work in Marion County.

Another area of concern is 318.8 cases of newly diagnosed chlamydia per 100,000 people. That number is lower than the state and national averages, which are 478.5 and 481.3 respectively, but still a trend up for Marion County since 2018, when the number was 263.

For clinical care, Marion County is ranked third in the state, which Pavelka says is "outstanding."

"I'd take top three any day for that," she says.

For social and economic factors, Marion County ranks number eight in the state. The county shows strong numbers for high school completion and unemployment, but an increasing number of children in poverty. Pavelka hypothesizes that those statistics can be attributed to employed people not earning high enough wages.

For the physical environment category, Marion County ranks only 56th. Pavelka says that the high volume of manufacturing in the area could be contributing to that lower rank.

"I just wonder if the physical environment doesn't get a hard knock because of that manufacturing draw, mainly driving to work along and the long community. I think that probably disproportionately throws Marion County down to those rankings, is my bias in that," she says.

In Marion County, 83% of survey respondents answered that mental illness needs attention in the community. In addition to that number, 45.5% said that suicide is an issue that needs attention. Other top responses were obesity, aging and dementia, teen health, including drinking, abuse and pregnancy, childcare services, drugs and illegal substances, abuse and violence, nutrition, chronic diseases and alcohol.

Eight percent of respondents said that they have experienced a food shortage in their home, approximately 25% answered that lack of childcare access has prevented them from going to work or school, and approximately 11% answered that they were in need of healthcare but avoiding going because of the cost.

After the presentation, attendees separated into small groups to identify priority areas for the next three years as Pella Regional moves toward creating a new improvement plan. Areas identified included but were not limited to mental health, substance abuse, healthcare workers, long-term care access, childcare access and OB/GYN care.

Pavelka's next steps will be to put the group responses into a rough draft action plan and begin the process of writing the improvement plan in conjunction with the hospital.

Channing Rucks can be reached at crucks@oskyherald.com.