The Rapides Foundation is dedicated to improving the health status of Central Louisiana through a focused program of grantmaking. To assure our grant decisions are based on current, valid and locally specific data, the Foundation has contracted with experts to perform Community Assessments in our nine-parish service area.

Our third, most recent assessment was released in 2007 and builds upon work begun a decade earlier.

The Foundation in 1997 contracted with the Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine to perform our first Community Assessment. Tulane researchers gathered data through the use of written and telephone surveys, interviews and focus groups, as well as through the use of local, state and federal databases. They also compiled an inventory of community resources in partnership with health and human service organizations in Central Louisiana.

At the end of the survey period, the research team met with The Rapides Foundation administration to review their findings and identify the most pressing and important issues that affect the health and well-being of Central Louisiana.

In 2001, The Foundation contracted with Professional Research Consultants Inc. (PRC) to conduct a second community health assessment to build on the work begun in 1997. It provided yet more insight into the health of our communities.

Then in 2005, The Foundation once again conducted an assessment of its nine-parish service area, updating the 2002 health assessment and broadening its data-collection efforts. Results were released in the spring of 2007.