I. Introduction

In the fall of 1994, the Hospital Consortium of San Mateo County began a collaborative planning process on behalf of the general acute care hospitals serving San Mateo County to develop a Community Health Needs Assessment of residents of San Mateo County. Organizations participating in the project included: Seton Medical Center, Seton Medical Center-Coastside, Mills-Peninsula Hospitals, San Mateo County General Hospital, Sequoia Hospital District, Kaiser Permanente Medical Center Redwood City, Kaiser Permanente Medical Center South San Francisco, Stanford Health Services, Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford and the San Mateo County Department of Health Services. The Consortium began this project by developing an exhaustive outline of statistical information to collect regarding residents' demographics, health status, health-related behaviors, access to health care services, environment and sociocultural environment. Rather than utilizing primary research to gather the information, the Consortium solicited recent research studies from agencies serving San Mateo County regarding their available statistical information and/or documentation of health and human services needs of San Mateo County residents.

At the project onset, the Consortium developed a listing of agencies to be solicited for their recent research studies and other related documents regarding health and human services needs. Hospital representatives assumed responsibility for contacting and collecting research and related documents from these agencies. The Consortium received good cooperation from local agencies in obtaining their research studies, collecting 160 documents that were included in the study. An inventory was prepared of the research and documents received, classifying the reports into one or more categories as appropriate: needs assessment; data and/or background information. Additionally, a brief description of each document was prepared. From these documents, a report profiling the residents of San Mateo County was prepared and services needs were identified for twenty target population groups:

Poor/marginally poor

Disabled

Elderly

Homeless

Single parent families

Teen parents

Mentally ill

Youth

Ex-offenders and their families

Lesbians/gay men

Substance abusers

Hispanics

Persons with AIDS or HIV

Asian/pacific islanders

Afro Americans

Native Americans

Recent immigrants/refugees/undocumented aliens

Veterans

Crime victims

General population

This report contains two major sections: the first section presents a profile of San Mateo County and its residents as developed from the statistical data obtained from documents received. This profile has been divided into six topic areas corresponding to the outline developed by the Consortium: demographic characteristics, health status information, health related behaviors, access to health care services, environment, and sociocultural environment.

The second major section is a delineation of the community needs based upon secondary research documents received. For each of the twenty-two target populations identified, unmet service needs are listed along with a reference to the document citing that particular service need. The following section provides a brief summary of the community service needs assessment.