PHHE 467 Deaths Caused by Alzheimer’s disease in DeKalb County

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Part II. Additional INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITIES. **********4-5 Pages*************

Assigned disease is deaths caused by Alzheimer’s disease in DeKalb County, Illinois. APA format with some sources

1. Statement of the Problem (or Objectiveof your Study).

  • Have you clearly stated what it is you want to study?
  • Why is the hypothesized situation important to DeKalb County?
  • If not now, could the problem be significant in the future due to possible changing demographics or other changes in the County’s health needs?
  • How does your proposed study contribute to the overall health status of your target population and the health status of DeKalb County now and in the future?

Other considerations/ items which must be included in this section of your paper:

  • Null Hypothesis (including independent and dependent variables). Use full wording.

  • Alternative Hypothesis (including independent and dependent variables; “if-then”) significant causation implied. What kind of causal relationship is it that you think is worthy of further funding and community intervention by the DeKalb County Health Department?

  • Additional concerns for you to include:
    • Are you proposing a Formative or Summative kind of evaluation and why?
    • Validity and Reliability of Study that you are doing, to confirm problem exists.
    • Purpose of proposed study: Exploratory, Explanatory, and/or Descriptive? Why?

2. Literature Review

  • Include in your discussion (short summary) the following:

At least 10 up-to-date resources (no older than 4 years old). Include:

    • Goodmanarticle: pick at least two of Goodman’s Principles and discuss their relevance to your study.
    • Joel Cowen’s Mental Health Study for DeKalb County.
  • Note: Goodman’s article and Cowen’s PowerPoint are of course older than 4 years. We are

using Goodman for evaluation theoryand Cowen for the formfor four kinds of assessment.

  • DeKalb County IPLAN; DeKalb County: what data were specifically relevant to your particular study, and why? (Make sure that you use the 2017-2022 MAPP version, NOT theold APEX-PH model version). Available under “Course Information”.

  • Summarize how each of the 10 resources is expected to contribute to the

quality (validity and reliability) of your study. Compare and contrast them; find similarities and support for your Hypothesis.

  • NO WIKIPEDIA citation as a direct source of information! Not necessarily a competent or reliable source of information! Minus 10 overall presentation points if used!

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3. Subjects for Study

  • The health statusas expressed in incidence or prevalence of your target population’s problemis ALWAYS your dependent variable. The health status of the target population is what you wish to eventually change to reflect progress toward a stated goal. The usual reason it has been chosen is that it is abnormally higher or lower than the incidence or prevalence of a problem on a statewide or national basis.

  • What is your independent variable? Why was it chosen (usually suggested by previous research/ findings)? What do you hypothesize is causing the rate of incidence or prevalence to be less or more than the desired status (use State of Illinois and Federal “benchmarks” as points of comparison and evaluation of the need for the intervention).

  • Why is this health status anomaly a true “problem”, not merely a “condition”?

Other considerations you will want to address in “Subjects for Study”:

  • Whom or what will you study in order to collect data?
  • In specific terms, who or what is available for study?
  • How will you reach them?
  • What kind of sample(s) are you going to have? How will you do that?
  • Do you know if the sample you intend to select will be representative of

your Target population? How and why do you know?

  • Is there any possibility that your study will affect those you study?
  • How will you ensure that your study doesn’t harm them?
  • How will our choice of a survey or field research methods influence subject selection

4. Measurement

  • What kind of research method (study design) do you propose to use and why? (best to have multiple indicators of a problem coming from different perspectives, as in Joel Cowen’s presentation). This is a short explanation of options and which would be best for your study.
  • Quantitative? Qualitative? Both? Why one or the other? Why both?
  • Field Research/ Community Assessment
  • Secondary source analysis?
  • Key Informant?
  • Focus Groups?
  • (See Joel Cowen’s presentation—his four ways of assessing health disparities within the Community). The best presentation will show how each of the four types of data

acquisition will be used in your type of evaluation. Actual survey or focus questions need to be submitted, shown in your Appendix. How are you going to measure what you propose to collect? What kind of format are you going to use so that your form of measurement and results are clearly presented?

  • How do you propose to measure changes you expect to see in the dependent variable caused by your independent variable (intervention) in your final plan? Changes need to be expressed in exact terms—can’t just be “we want to see an increase”. An increase in what in terms of Measurement? (Hint: Incidence or Prevalence per 1,000 or 10,000. etc.).

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5. Data-Collection Methods

  • How will you actually collect the data for your study?
  • Will you conduct an experiment or a survey? (see above: coordinate with the person doing Measurement).
  • This section is what you actually choose as research, and how you’re going to go about it.
  • Will you undertake field research (above) or focus on reanalysis of existing statistics already created by others (think IPLAN, data sets from state, local, federal and “specialty” not for profits).
  • Remember that the more sources confirming the same problem you have, the better your research and evaluation of a community problem will “sell”. A single indicator of a “problem” in a community may only indicating a “condition” of a particular set of persons, not a confirming “problem” which is endemic to a significant part of a target population.

6. Analysis

  • Choose the kind of analysis you want to conduct that’s conducive to the stated aims and choices made by other participants in this exercise (Qualitative, Quantitative? Kind?)
  • Spell out the purpose and logic of your analysis once again (Exploratory, Descriptive, Explanatory)
  • Do you intend to explain why things are the way they are? Do you plan to account for some variations in health status—comparison of your target population to the general population of DeKalb County?
  • What possible explanatory variables are you going to highlight in your search to find the reason for identifying significant differences between your Target population and the general DeKalb County population (what do you thing makes this population worthy of intense study and intervention)?

  • How are the forms of Measurement and Data Collection that you’ve chosen going to

use in this proposed study going to explain why it would be a good idea to spend money on trying to reduce the incidence or prevalence of the problem you’ve identified?

7. Schedule

  • This is a timeline for accomplishing planning, research and data collection, analysis, publishing—everything you need to do from start of the project to finish.
  • The suggested time frame would be 6 months to 1 year, depending on the kinds of research intended, and quantity and complexity of your Research Design itself.
  • For a list of specific activities, see “How to design a research project” in Chapter 4 of your text. (The section concludes with “Application”).
  • Your timeline must be illustrated using a Gantt chart (see previous Week 6 folder for information as to how to do a Gantt chart in Excel).
  • For your paper, explain in words what you chart means for your one-page summary of your work. Include your actual Gantt chart in the Appendix.

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8. Budget

  • How much in dollars is it going to cost you in terms of the proposed research?
  • Look in your text for tips on what to budget—supplies, personnel,

space where you work is to be accomplished, land phone, cell phone, fax, and so forth.

  • Look online from a credible source as to how to construct a project budget for health services.
  • You can use a little creativity here, but it must be reasonable.
  • Coordinate with your “Schedule”. List budget totals by type of line item. Not as just one big lump sum.
  • Where are you going to get the money for the project,assuming your Team has made a good case for the preliminary project? (Catalogue of Federal Domestic Assistance, private foundations and/or other sources provided from earlier online post).
  • Project money source must include the following:

-Actual foundation or program you hope to get money from for the evaluation

-Due date for any application

-How this fits in with your general schedule of what you are going to do on a month-by-month basis. Can you begin your project without any money?

-How much money from each revenue source, and for what specificpurposes? Unrestricted use of funds (depends on funding source)?


Documents Attached is the study I am doing and additional information to help research.