279 Teaviisari – a tool for benchmarking safety promotion and injury prevention on local level

Abstract

BackgroundIn Finland, municipalities are responsible for promoting the health and welfare of their residents. Safety promotion and injury prevention are an integral part of health promotion on various fields of municipal action.Description of the problemUntil the launch of TEAviisari, a nationwide benchmarking tool for the management, planning and evaluation of health promotion capacity building (HPCB), there has been very little accurate and comparable nationwide information on health promoting activities in different sectors in Finnish municipalities.ResultsAiming to make measures taken by local authorities visible and to provide information on actions that promote better public health on local level, TEAviisari is based on a generic HPCB framework. The framework consists of seven dimensions: commitment, management, monitoring and needs assessment, resources, common practices, participation and core functions. Safety and injury related topics covered in TEAviisari include but are not limited to prevention of home and leisure accident injuries, inspection of health and safety at schools, home-school collaboration to promote safety, prevention and monitoring of accidents and injuries at school, compiling a local safety plan, evaluating older person’s housing safety and having expertise on health and safety technology and assistive devices. The results show that differences between municipalities and schools exist in all topics. The data can be viewed on municipal level or on various geographical or administrative levels. Data for single schools are shown with the permission of the school.ConclusionsTEAviisari shows that it is possible to assess the HPCB of municipalities, serving as a tool for the local government while making it transparent to the residents. Web-based user interface provides a quick access to relevant, interpreted information for decision-makers. TEAviisari is free of charge and available at in Finnish, Swedish and English.