Health inequality monitoring - measuring what and how, exactly?

Abstract

Abstract The output from health inequality monitoring systems at the national level should be comparable across countries to enable judgements about how health inequalities evolves in the EU. Such comparability presumes a common approach to what kind of data should be compiled, what indicators to focus and what measures to use. Hence, there are many decisions to be made and to agree upon. Only in terms of possible indicators, there is an overwhelming number of possibilities. This is confusing and could easily lead to diverging conclusions on how health inequalities develop within and across countries over time. As part of the Joint Action Health Equity Europe and the work conducted in work package five on monitoring, a core health inequality indicator set is being developed. The set should include a small number of indicators and contain information on health, on social determinants of health and on some measure of social position, preferably education. The indicator set should be based on data already reported to EU and liaised with other indicator initiatives. The final set will be proposed to be included on available EC platforms and specific websites as indicators of health inequalities. Such an indicator set will facilitate valid judgements on how health inequalities evolves in countries and in the EU. In this presentation, we will learn more about the proposed JAHEE indicator set, and about the work process. We will also get a chance to reflect on and discuss the proposed indicators and measures. The auditorium will be invited to reflect on conclusions.