Testing three health impact assessment tools in planning: A process evaluation

There is increasing interest in Health Impact Assessment in planning. This paper describes the results of different approaches to health impact assessment (HIA) conducted in 10 municipalities and one county in Minnesota. The paper outlines the HIA processes, outputs, and short-term outcomes concluding that it is important to engage a diverse group of stakeholders. Overall, HIA is potentially an important new tool in the planning toolkit. Strategic use of HIA to evaluate draft plans and inform plan updates and project redesigns can help raise awareness about health issues and focus planning on important human problems.