Abstract: Friends of Parkside is a community-based organization dedicated to addressing various health and safety issues adversely affecting the community. FOP aims to provide a healthy environment for residents, strengthen the relationships amongst the community members, encourage residents to be more proactive in addressing neighborhood issues and create opportunities for continuous community growth. To support FOP’s health and safety focus every year a health and safety fair is organized with the primary objective to highlight and provide solutions for prevalent health, food, and safety issues within the community that were identified in a 2009 health assessment conducted by University of Michigan Public Health Graduate Students. This year’s 2013 Parkside Health Fair was a success, which resulted in 17 participating vendors and approximately 100 attendees who utilized various services offered. Evaluations were collected from both participating vendors and attend-ees. Results from vendor’s evaluations reported that 52% had a good overall perception of the health fair and 48% had an excellent overall perception of the health fair. Also 91% of vendors wanted to return next year and 8.33% said maybe. The attendee’s evaluation reported that 46% had a good overall perception of the health fair, 46% had an excellent overall perception of the health fair, and 100% wished to return next year. This year we increased the number of vendors in attendance, as well as the number of attendees. Each year FOP anticipates exceeding expectations of preceding years.

Objective:

To provide health resources for the community via a health fair.

Methods:

1. We referred to a 2009 health assessment which evaluated the most common health conditions residents face.2. We organized a health fair and partnered with very diverse health agencies in order to provide the community with as many resources as possible.3. Following our health fair we dispersed evaluations to participating vendors, which asked them a variety of questions ultimately describing their perception of the health fair and their desire to return in future years. 4. Finally, to collect the community member’s feedback, we designated an area for “attendee evaluations” during the health fair. The questions in this survey measured community members overall level of satisfaction and their desire to return next year.

Conclusions:

The 2013 health fair was a success according to evaluations. However, there is still room for further improvements. Limited parking was a reoccurring theme, so next year we will need to better accommodate vendors and reserve more spots for our 1 day event. Also, next year we will need to reconsider how effective our advertising methods are. Awareness is vital for any event and there was no indication outdoors that a health fair was in progress, which could have affected the number of people in attendance. Finally, next year we need to advance the services offered. For example, immunizations for families and dental care would be a great attribute.

Results:

Results from vendor’s evaluations reported that 52% had a good overall perception of the health fair and 48% had an excellent overall perception of the health fair. Also 91% of vendors wanted to return next year and 8.33% said maybe. The attendee’s evaluation reported that 46% had a good overall perception of the health fair, 46% had an excellent overall perception of the health fair, and 100% wished to return next year.

Hypothesis:

Friends Of Parkside’s health fair will be effective in providing resources that address prominent health concerns and conditions community members have.

Health Resources for the Community Community-Based Research Fellowship Jasmyne Morgan, Zachary Rowe, Kevin Worthy