New Online Tool Provides Health Snapshot of All 435 U.S. Congressional Districts

{NYU Grossman School of Medicine]

"Today, researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine, in partnership with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), unveiled the Congressional District Health Dashboard (CDHD), a new online tool that provides critical health data for all 435 congressional districts and the District of Columbia. The dashboard incorporates 36 key measures of health, such as deaths from cardiovascular disease and breast cancer, along with conditions that affect health, like housing affordability and access to nutritious foods. Until now, most of these data were not available at the congressional district level, nor were they compiled in a single location or easily available to the public.

The Congressional District Health Dashboard’s data reveal stark geographic, and racial and ethnic differences in health and wellbeing across congressional districts in the United States. For example, people living in congressional districts in the 11 states that have not expanded Medicaid coverage under the Affordable Care Act are twice as likely to be uninsured compared to those in states with expanded Medicaid coverage. In fact, residents of congressional districts in Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Texas on average are almost 3.5 times more likely to be uninsured than those in congressional districts in New England. On average, Hispanic residents have the highest rates of uninsurance in most congressional districts across the country.

“The Congressional District Health Dashboard will help fill a critical need for timely, rigorous, and actionable data that can inform evidence-based policymaking,” says Marc Gourevitch, MD, MPH, chair of the Department of Population Health at NYU Langone Health and the initiative’s principal architect. “Now, policymakers, advocates, and others can drill down to their specific congressional districts to identify the opportunities and challenges affecting the health and wellbeing of all the people they serve, regardless of income, race, or zip code.”.."
Congressional District Health Dashboard