Keeping Us Healthy Here in Los
Angeles:
Los Angeles County Department of
Public Health protects health,
prevents disease, and promotes
health and well being for all
persons in Los Angeles County. Our
focus is on the Los Angeles County
population as a whole, and we
conduct our activities through a
network of public health
professionals throughout the
community. Every day, the
population of Los Angeles is
protected by hundreds of public
health measures.
Drinking safe water,
vaccinating our children, and
health education regarding the
harmful effects of unprotected sex
are examples of public health
measures fundamental to good
health. This site provides
information about other programs and
interventions conducted by the Los
Angeles County's Public Health and
other community agencies that aim to
protect and promote health for
residents countywide.
National Health Objectives:
Recently the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services published
Healthy People 2010: Understanding
and Improving Health. This
large volume (over 10 megabits)
represents the third national effort
to establish health objectives for
the Nation.
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Healthy People 2010 reflects the
scientific advances that have
taken place over the past 20
years in preventive medicine,
disease surveillance, vaccine
and therapeutic development, and
information technology.
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The report mirrors the changing
demographics of our country, the
changes that have taken place in
health care, and the growing
impact of global forces on our
national health status.
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Healthy People 2010 incorporates
input from a broad cross-section
of people as well as scientific
experts from many agencies.
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There are 467 objectives in 28
focus areas, making Healthy
People 2010 an encyclopedic
compilation of health
improvement opportunities for
the next decade.
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This set of Leading Health
Indicators will help individuals
and communities target the
actions to improve health. The
Leading Health Indicators will
also help communities track the
success of these actions.
Evaluating What Works in
Public Health: To address this
question a national
Task Force on Community Preventive
Services was created consisting
of 15 national experts (including
our own Director of Public Health
and Health Officer, Dr. Jonathan
Fielding) from local health
departments, managed care, academia,
behavioral and social sciences,
communications sciences, mental
health, epidemiology, quantitative
policy analysis, decision and
cost-effectiveness analysis,
information systems, primary care,
and management and policy.
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The Task Force has established a
web site which is in the
form of a Community Guide
dealing with health
interventions. A variety of
health topics important to
communities, public health
agencies and health care systems
are addressed. The Guide
summarizes what is known about
the effectiveness and
cost-effectiveness of population
based interventions designed to
promote health, prevent disease,
injury, disability and premature
death as well as exposure to
environmental hazards.
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Systematic reviews are presented
for interventions by health
topic and organized as
chapters within the
Community Guide. These reviews
evaluate whether their is
sufficient evidence to show that
an intervention is effective or
not. For those interventions
where there is insufficient
evidence of effectiveness, the
Community Guide provides
guidance for further prevention
research.
