Health in All Policies Technical Assistance Hub

KHI provides technical assistance to six communities under the Pathways to a Healthy Kansas Initiative, which is funded by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Kansas (BCBSKS). This assistance encompasses helping communities establish a Health in All Policies (HiAP) Task Force and utilizing a Health Impact Checklist (HI-C) to assess the health implications of various decisions, including those related to housing. Additionally, KHI focuses on building stakeholder capacity in conducting health and equity lens analyses. This involves evaluating how health and equity considerations are integrated within documents, guidance and protocols, and providing recommendations for improvement. Moreover, KHI supports the development of HiAP policies at the organizational, city and county levels, and actively works to incorporate HiAP principles into other initiatives, such as Food and Farm Councils. 

KHI conducted Health in All Policies (HiAP), Health Impact Assessment (HIA) and Health Impact Checklist (HI-C) workshops in Kansas and nationally in partnership with Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, the Health Impact Project, a collaboration of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and The Pew Charitable Trust and the National Network of Public Health Institutes.  Workshops, conducted both in person and virtually, were held in Bourbon, Cowley, Crawford, Douglas, Franklin, McPherson, Reno, Riley, Shawnee, Sedgwick and Wyandotte counties and nationwide (e.g., Louisiana, Minnesota, Nevada, Rhode Island and New York). The audiences included local health departments and state health department, health coalitions, hospitals, elected officials and representatives from varies sectors. The goals were to cultivate a deep understanding of the HiAP approach, emphasizing its fundamental principles and the importance of integrating health considerations into the decision-making and processes of diverse sectors. Additionally, participants were provided with practical strategies for HiAP implementation and collaborated to identify opportunities for integrating HiAP practices into their organizational or community initiatives. 

KHI developed several tools (Health Impact Checklist Tool (HI-C) and Health Lens Analysis) aimed at enhancing the capacity for a comprehensive health perspective in decision-making, planning, process development and policy formulation. Other resources include a guide with practical lessons for individuals interested in conducting Health Impact Assessments (HIA), and ideas for framing and communicating about Health in All Policies, which is a joint product with the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, and a guide to communicate about equity in HIAs.  

KHI partners with the Department of Population Health at the University of Kansas School of Medicine to provide guest lectures on Health in All Policies (HiAP) to masters-level public health students. The lectures introduce HiAP concepts and demonstrate the use of the Health Impact Checklist as a way to examine potential positive and negative health and equity impacts of policies. Building student capacity in recognizing, assessing,and communicating these impacts could help shape future public health leaders. For more information about the collaboration, read Guest Lectures: Increasing Student Knowledge of Health in All Policies by Using the Health Impact Checklist, which was published in the Chronicles of Health Impact Assessment (CHIA), a journal published by the Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health at Indiana University-Purdue University.  

KHI has conducted assessments to identify potential health effects of policies related to topics such as casinos, transportation, liquor licensing, medical marijuana, agriculture, and water.