The goal of this clinical trial is to learn if an innovative online decision support tool (Chart) that provides localized health risk assessment for extreme heat at the census tract level helps local health departments plan and prepare for extreme heat by identifying risk drivers in their jurisdictions, highlighting interventions that are effective for their jurisdiction's risk profile, and providing information regarding intervention implementation. This trial will evaluate barriers and facilitators of the tool's implementation. The main questions it aims to answer are: 1. Does a health department using the tool have better reach, effectiveness, adoption, implementation, and maintenance of heat-health activities compared with an information-only control? 2. What are the barriers and facilitators of Chart's implementation? Researchers will compare health departments using Chart to health departments using provided heat-health information only.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
OTHER
Masking
NONE
Enrollment
30
The intervention group will receive facilitated engagement with Chart. Chart is an online decision support platform designed to support evidence-based risk assessment and planning for extreme heat risk mitigation. Chart has a risk assessment platform that provides estimates of heat-health risks at a census tract level under various hazard conditions. It also has a decision support platform that links drivers of risk in a given location with information about potential risk reduction activities and includes information useful to policymakers regarding intervention efficacy, timing, and cost. Facilitated engagement includes an initial introduction to the platform, real-time questions and answers, and focused discussion regarding priority interventions and planning and implementation needs. This engagement comprises about five hours of time that can be provided over the course of a couple weeks or several months, depending on the needs of the health department.
Study participants in the control group will be provided with a package of information supportive of heat-health vulnerability and risk assessment and planning for risk reduction activities through built environment hazard mitigation and public health programming. This package will include an annotated list of online resources, including those available on Heat.gov and the CDC website, and a selected set of review papers on heat-health vulnerability, heat-health risk assessment, heat hazard mitigation through built environment strategies, and heat action planning and preparedness.
University of Washington
Seattle, Washington, United States
Baseline assessment: demographics
All departments will undertake the pre-intervention baseline assessment. The baseline assessment will gather information related to organizational demographics and demographics of the communities that the organization serves.
Time frame: Baseline
Baseline assessment: current activities
All departments will undertake the pre-intervention baseline assessment. The baseline assessment will gather information related to the organization's current activities relevant to extreme heat, including surveillance and program evaluation activities.
Time frame: Baseline
Baseline assessment: implementation factors
All departments will undertake the pre-intervention baseline assessment. The baseline assessment will gather information related to contextual and organizational factors that may affect intervention implementation.
Time frame: Baseline
Post-intervention survey: demographics
Meaningful changes in the demographics of the organization or service area.
Time frame: Eight months after the intervention begins.
Post-intervention survey: activities
The the post-intervention assessment will query participants regarding meaningful changes in the organization's activities and profile (e.g., the occurrence of a regional disaster that disrupted service provision across the organization).
Time frame: Eight months after the intervention begins.
Key informant interviews
Barriers and facilitators of Chart implementation and implementation outcomes using linkages to theoretical frameworks. Investigators will conduct key informant interviews (KIIs) with all 15 of the primary site contacts for the sites randomized to the intervention group. In this case, investigators will reference the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR) as a source of constructs to measure factors affecting Chart's implementation.
Time frame: The key informant interviews will be completed eight months after the intervention begins.
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