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Strategies to improve health care access, mental health outlined in Ottawa County community health improvement plan

The Holland Sentinel - 11/17/2021

Nov. 17—Almost 40 percent of "underserved" residents are struggling to meet their health care and mental health needs. A new plan outlines strategies to address this and several other issues identified in a community-wide health survey.

The Healthy Ottawa Advisory Council released the 2021 Healthy Ottawa Plan on Monday. The plan, released every three years, outlines responses to health issues identified by community members and stakeholders in the health care industry.

The results of the 2020 survey, the Community Health Needs Assessment, were released in March. The CHNA initially identified 10 key areas, and the Healthy Ottawa Plan outlines plans to address three focus areas — access to health care, mental health and promoting overall healthy behaviors.

The advisory council is made up of several community health stakeholders, including the Ottawa County Department of Public Health, Community Mental Health, Greater Ottawa United Way, Community SPOKE and local hospitals.

The CHNA found 38 percent of underserved and vulnerable adults had trouble meeting health care needs in 2020. Barriers to health care for the population include cost — nearly 55 percent of respondents said health care being too expensive was the reason for having difficulty meeting health care needs.

The Healthy Ottawa Plan outlines a goal of increasing access to patient-centered and community integrated health care. To reach this goal, the plan lists objectives of increasing the percentage of adults confident in navigating the health system, making sure more adults have a primary care provider and lowering the proportion of adults who don't have health insurance due to financial constraints.

The percentage of adults citing cost as a barrier to health care access increased from 2017 to 2020, going from 7.4 percent in 2017 to 8.6 percent last year.

In the plan, strategies to remove cost as a barrier to health care access include bolstering efforts to enroll individuals without health care plans, increased education efforts on Medicaid and Medicare plans at low or no cost and increasing transparency on the cost of medical care ahead of time.

Compared to the 2017 CHNA, mental health outcomes have worsened among surveyed residents.

Close to one in six county adults (15.3 percent) report poor mental health, close to double 2017's rate. Of those surveyed, 1 in 20 reported having thoughts of suicide — among this group, 1 in 5 reported attempting suicide in the past year.

"While the pandemic had a negative ripple effect on many health outcomes for Ottawa County adults, perhaps no impact was greater than on their mental health," the plan states.

The plan lists goals of decreasing the percentage of Ottawa County adults in poor mental health, increasing the percentage of adults receiving mental health care for their needs and decreasing the percentage of adults and youth with thoughts of or attempts at suicide.

Stakeholders want to improve mental health outcomes by partnering with employers to provide mental health resources. Increasing the amount of mental health care providers in the community is also a recommended strategy.

Other strategies include providing education on coping with stress, reducing stigma associated with mental health struggles and encouraging primary health providers to discuss mental health.

Access to affordable, nutritious food remains a barrier for many respondents. The percentage of "obese" adults in Ottawa County increased from 2017 to 2020.

To combat this, recommended strategies include increasing casual exercise programs, promoting food assistance measures, promoting healthy cooking classes and creating culturally relevant nutritious recipes.

According to a news release, efforts to implement the various strategies listed in the Healthy Ottawa Plan will begin Jan. 1. The full plan can be viewed at healthyottawa.org.

— Contact Arpan Lobo at alobo@hollandsentinel.com. Follow him on Twitter @arpanlobo.

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