Community Assessment & Analysis
“Windshield Survey”
Community Assessment & Analysis “Windshield Survey”
Nurses must be able to knowledgeably plan services for
individuals, families and the community. In order to effectively
plan, it is essential that you assess the current health status of the
community and its resources.
Assessment may include the following strategies: Mining of health
data bases, windshield or walking surveys, and more formal
quantitative and qualitative research investigations involving
community members and other stakeholders. A “windshield
survey” is conducted from a car and provides a visual overview of
a community (may also be done as a walking survey). Conditions
and trends in the community that could affect the health of the
population (social determinants) are noted. Most surveys of this
type must be validated and expanded through data mining of
available online and other databases of demographic and healthrelated statistics.
Evidence collected during a formal community assessment forms
the basis for planning to improve the health status of the
community, which impacts individuals’ health downstream.

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