Question

Analyze expected outcomes in a situation that involves a critical health care or public health issue

Answer 1

Evaluation of a process to measure the result or outcome of an event whether its a health care program or an intervention to solve a public health issue. An expected outcome is said to be achieved when the goals or the objectives set for a particular program or intervention is met. These outcomes usually regarding a critical health care or a public health issue is expected to have positive outcomes. To explain this let me frame an example:

Scenario: In a village since past five years, the mortality rates among adults due to malaria has increased by threefold. This increase in the cases of malaria has been reported especially in those areas of the village which is known for the breeding place of vector of diseases i.e mosquito prone area. The primary health care functioning in the village decides to launch a vector control program after a small educational workshop conducted in the subcenter of the village. The date and venue was informed to the members of the village. The members actively participated in the educational workshop and due to the increased deaths caused by malaria, they pledged to adopt the vector control measures in their locality.

In the above scenario, the public health issue is the increased mortality among the villagers due to malaria. The goal that was set for this program was

• reduce the deaths caused by malaria
• to destroy the vector i.e mosquitoes by adopting the antilarval measure.
• Early identification and treatment of the cases diagnosed positive for malaria in blood test.

The expected outcome of the situation is that reduction in number of deaths due to malaria is noted. The people learned the use of anti larval measures to control mosquitoes. All the cases reported in the clinic received adequate treatment on time.