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Mahoning, Trumbull don’t fare well in County Health Rankings
Mahoning and Trumbull counties are rated among the more unhealthy of Ohio’s 88 counties, according to the 2011 County Health Rankings.
The survey, however, did rank the two counties in the top 10 and top 20 in certain categories.
Delaware County has the healthiest state residents, and Lawrence County is Ohio’s least healthy county, according to the survey released this week by the University of Wisconsin Population Health Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
According to the rankings, residents of Lawrence County are more than two times likely to die a premature death than those in Delaware County.
Overall, out of Ohio’s 88 counties, Mahoning County is ranked 76th, Trumbull County, 71st, and Columbiana County, 41, according to the Johnson Foundation survey.
Neighboring counties Geauga and Portage are ranked second and 22nd, respectively.
“We’ve seen improvements since last year in both Mahoning and Trumbull counties in certain areas,” said Matthew Stefanak, health commissioner of the Mahoning County District Board of Health.
For instance, Stefanak said Mahoning is seventh in the state in the clinical-care category, which looks at the ratio of population to physicians, the percentage of diabetic Medicare enrollees who receive blood-sugar screening, and the percentage of Medicare females enrollees who receive mammographies, among other things.
The two counties also improved in the health-factors category, which considers adult smoking and obesity, excessive drinking, motor- vehicle crash deaths per 100,000 population, sexually transmitted diseases, and the rate of births for 15- to 19-year-olds per 1,000 female population.
Trumbull is 54th in the clinical-care category, and Columbiana County, which has a much higher overall rating, is 68th, according to the survey.
“Social and Economic Factors” is the category in which Mahoning and Trumbull both scored very low, 84th and 78th, respectively. Columbiana County is 64th.
That category measures things such as the percentage of ninth-graders who graduate from high school; percentage of people over 16 who are unemployed but seeking work; percentage of children under 16 living in poverty; percentage of single-parent households among all households; and the homicide rate per 100,000 population.
“Without jobs and education and a stable family environment, the chances of good health go down,” Stefanak said.
He said public health and hospital organizations in the tri-county, after the 2010 survey, formed the Community Health Assessment and Planning Committee to develop strategies to address problem areas.
The Community Health Assessment and Planning Committee is an effort to identify local needs and then address them, said Wes Vins, Columbiana County Health commissioner.
The local planning organization and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation survey are excellent tools to use in developing strategies, Vins said.
He said the Johnson Foundation report does a couple of things: “It provides us with a community yardstick that will help us target our local public-health resources and provides data that we don’t have the staff and expertise to put together,” he said.
It is important to recognize survey’s goal is not to pit one county against any other. The data is to assist local officials focus their initiatives. “It gives us a snapshot of where our community is healthwise,” Vins said.
“Think of the Johnson Foundation survey as a report card. You get more than one grade ... some ‘A’s,’ such as in clinical care and health behaviors, and some areas in social and economic facts where the grades are ‘D’ or worse,” Stefanak said.
According to 2011 County Health Rankings, the 10 healthiest counties in Ohio, starting with most healthy, are Delaware, Geauga, Medina, Holmes, Warren, Putnam, Mercer, Greene, Hancock, Auglaize.
The 10 counties in the poorest health, starting with least healthy, are Lawrence, Scioto, Jackson, Gallia, Vinton, Meigs, Adams, Pike, Ross, Harrison. The healthiest of Ohio’s 88 counties are in the north and west; the least healthy counties are primarily in the south.