DURHAM, N.H. -What will the state of New Hampshire's health look like over the next two decades? What will the challenges be in meeting the health care needs of our residents? A new website (www.MapNHHealth.org) provides a novel way to examine what the state's people and their health could look like in 2020 and 2030. MapNH Health is targeted to community and business leaders, policy makers and engaged consumers in the state, and is designed to inform both public policy and community conversations about how New Hampshire can best prepare for the future health and health care needs of the state's residents.

The MapNH Health project was developed by the NH Citizens Health Initiative (NH CHI) and the Institute for Health Policy and Practice (IHPP) at the University of New Hampshire. The user-friendly website provides information mapped geographically by county and healthcare service area and allows users to view projections of demographics, health behaviors and health outcomes. The ultimate goal is to engage stakeholders in community conversations that will examine what might happen, given the data, in order to formulate plans and public policy that will address New Hampshire's future health needs.

"MapNH Health provides a lens through which we can look at New Hampshire's health care landscape across three points in time: 2010, 2020 and 2030," said Jeanne Ryer, director of NH CHI. "By understanding how our population, health behaviors, outcomes, and our access to health care will change over time, we can start to talk about how to meet New Hampshire's future health and health care needs."

Ryer continues, "For example, we know that the northern parts of our state have an increasingly older population compared with the southern region. This aging of the population will impact the region's economy and health care needs. The need for health care services will increase, but the region will have fewer workers available to provide those services as many residents will have aged out of the workforce. We'll also be able to look at specific indicators, such as diabetes or Alzheimer's disease, and consider what impact they might have on needed health care services, and how the available services might impact outcomes and cost of care."

The interactive website was built through collaboration between University of New Hampshire's Web and Mobile Development and the Applied Population Laboratory at the University of Wisconsin, utilizing data modeling and projections performed by the Applied Population Laboratory's health geographer and demographer. Projections are based on current New Hampshire health indicators and population projections for 2020 and 2030.

The launch of the website was announced today at the NH Hospital Association Annual Meeting in Bretton Woods, at which Ryer joined a panel presentation to discuss the state's health service needs and how health systems, communities and policy makers can work together to adequately plan for the future health related needs of the state.

NH CHI has begun the stakeholder engagement process, including outreach to consumers, policy makers, business and industry leaders, hospitals and health systems, social service providers, public health professionals and educators. That work will continue through 2015.

MapNH Health has benefitted from advisory assistance provided by a broad spectrum of organizations and agencies including: Bi-State Primary Care Association, Community Health Institute, Foundation for Healthy Communities, NH Purchasers Group on Health, NH Hospital Association, NH Voices for Health, The Dartmouth Institute, NH Department of Insurance, NH Division of Public Health Services, NH Office of Energy and Planning, NH Department of Transportation, NH Medical Society, AARP, Endowment for Health, Nashua Regional Planning Commission, North Country Health Consortium, the Rippel Foundation, NH Business and Industry Association, Granite United Way, Upper Connecticut Valley Hospital, Healthy NH Foundation, UNH Cooperative Extension and NH Office of Minority Health and Refugee Affairs. External support for the MapNH Health project has been provided by AARP and Endowment for Health.

The Institute for Health Policy and Practice (IHPP) at the University of New Hampshire is an applied research institute, established in 1999, to conduct and disseminate high-quality, cutting-edge applied research and policy work that enables health system partners to implement evidence-based strategies to improve public health.

The NH Citizens Health Initiative is a multi-stakeholder collaborative effort that promotes systems transformation in New Hampshire to improve the health of NH's population, in line with the Triple Aim. The Initiative, a program of the Institute of Health Policy and Practice (IHPP) at the University of New Hampshire, has a ten-year history of leading, incubating, and testing innovative transformation efforts, including its NH Accountable Care learning collaborative to support health systems in using data to improve care and reduce costs and work on integrating public health with clinical care, in addition to its work on MapNH Health. Earlier projects have included a multi-stakeholder commercial medical home pilot, successfully promoting electronic prescribing throughout the state, primary care workforce, and support for system transparency on price and quality.

The University of New Hampshire, founded in 1866, is a world-class public research university with the feel of a New England liberal arts college. A land, sea, and space-grant university, UNH is the state's flagship public institution, enrolling 12,300 undergraduate and 2,200 graduate students.

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