Every spring for the past four years, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) in collaboration with the University of Wisconsin has released data on the health of each county in the United States. The County Health Rankings, in addition to providing data on health outcomes and behaviors, ranks each county in every state from the most to the least healthy. The newest version was released yesterday. CHN has previously worked with the research team behind the County Health Rankings in the development of the County Health Calculator.

The city of Richmond, Virginia—where CHN is located—ranks 121^st out of 133 Virginia cities and counties in overall health rankings, up from 125^th in 2012. In the four years the rankings have been produced, the city of Richmond has never ranked higher than 121^st in the commonwealth of Virginia for overall health rankings. The rankings estimate that Richmond citizens lost 12,822 years of potential life per 100,000 residents due to premature death in 2013, a rate almost three and a half times larger than that of Fairfax County, the number one ranked county in overall health.

A comparison of the health behaviors between the two Virginia communities is illustrative of why there is such a large discrepancy in health outcomes. Richmond has a larger prevalence of adult smoking and obesity than Fairfax but the biggest differences are in social factors. Just over half of Richmond 9^th graders graduated high school in four years compared to 83% of Fairfax 9^th graders. Almost a third of Richmond children live in poverty compared to one of every seventeen children in Fairfax. Most strikingly, the violent crime rate in Richmond is thirteen times higher in Richmond than it is in Fairfax.

CHN’s core research agenda is in understanding, quantifying, and translating to policymakers the relationship between these social characteristics and health. Although our scope can be as wide as the entire nation, we have a special interest in the well-being of Richmond residents, both because it is our home and because we work with those in the city who have to navigate obstacles to healthy living.

Engaging Richmond (ER), a collaborative partnership of CHN staff and community researchers, is committed to understanding and addressing the social factors contributing to some of the health discrepancies outlined in RWJF’s County Health Rankings.

ER research and community-based solutions have captured the attention of local media and are featured in two recent articles. To view the articles, click the titles below:

• Project engages East End Residents in discussions on improving health, Richmond Times-Dispatch, January 27, 2013

• Richmond’s East End has stark health challenges, Richmond Times-Dispatch, January 27, 2013

ER continues to build strategic partnerships and share its research findings with area service providers and policymakers with the goal of improving health outcomes for all Richmond residents.