Measures of Disease Frequency

Measures of Disease Frequency

In 2009, President Obama launched a nationwide initiative to end homelessness in the U.S. by 2020. The homeless are a vulnerable population with limited access to health care and poor health outcomes. In order to allocate sufficient federal and local resources to eliminate homelessness, U.S. cities conduct an annual survey to estimate the number of homeless persons living within major cities. The City of Boston’s Emergency Shelter Commission (ESC) conducted a survey of homelessness on the night of January 25, 2017. Volunteers counted the number of homeless persons living on the streets, in emergency shelters for individuals or families, in domestic violence programs, in residential mental health or substance abuse programs, transitional housing, and in specialized programs.

1. Which of the following best describes the homeless population in the City of Boston?

a. Dynamic population

b. Fixed population

2.  Which of the following describes the homeless population that took part in the ESC survey on January 25^th?

a. Dynamic population

b. Fixed population

3. The 2015 Homeless Census counted 3,456 homeless persons in Boston. The 2016 homeless census counted 3,384 homeless persons in Boston. The size of the population in Boston was 665,984 in 2015 and 673,184 in 2016. From 2015-2016, did the burden of homelessness:

a. Increase

b. Decrease

c. Stay the same (2015: .52%, 2016 0.50%)

d. Cannot determine from this information

4. What do you consider to be the biggest limitation in the homeless survey and why?

5. Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program (BHCHP) analyzed deaths among homeless adults who were seen at their program from 1/1/2003 through 12/31/2008 (Baggett et al., 2014).  A total of 1,302 deaths occurred during the observation period among the 28,033 study population. The table below gives the race and gender of the decedents and total population.