RHAD Toolkit 2.0

Tier 1 - Fundamental Approach

Step 2: Determine the Assessment Method

Next, determine how you will collect data (e.g., your assessment method). The types of questions that you want to ask and resources available to you will determine which assessment method to use. Surveys, individual interviews, and focus groups are some options to collect data about reproductive age, pregnant, and post-partum women, and infants after a disaster. The assessments in this toolkit are best administered in a survey or interview format but can be adapted for focus groups as well.

Surveys, interviews, and focus groups have the following general pros and cons. Check out this Michigan.gov Data Collection Pro’s and Con’s list for a more in-depth look.

Method

Pros

Cons

Surveys

  • Quick – respondents can more easily answer questions within a few minutes
  • Potentially able to collect data from a larger number of respondents
  • Provides more privacy for respondents
  • Not able to ask for clarification of comments or ratings
  • Easier for respondents to ignore if collecting data via email or text or they may stop taking the survey before they reach the end

Interviews

  • Able to collect more in-depth responses from a specific population
  • Able to ask for clarification of participants’ responses
  • More time intensive and expensive to conduct
  • Requires strong interviewing skills – need trained interviewers or to develop training materials to train interviewers
  • Less anonymity for respondents
  • Respondents may not feel comfortable with having their participation audio-recorded, video-taped, or transcribed

Focus groups

  • Able to obtain information from a number of people at one time.
  • Participants can brainstorm/bounce ideas with each other
  • Respondents who prefer anonymity may not feel comfortable sharing in a group
  • Some group members may dominate the conversation, which may prevent others from sharing opinions
  • Respondents may not feel comfortable with having their participation audio-recorded, video-taped, or transcribed

Helpful tip 1: People who have lost their homes or are displaced due to a disaster may be more difficult to find, which will impact the method you plan to use. For example, you may find it easier to host a focus group at a shelter compared to visiting a home address that no longer exists. Or you may be able to reach your target population more easily by texting a survey link compared to interviews or focus groups.

 

Incentives (optional)  

Incentives of $25 or less (Examples: online gift cards, tote bags, water bottles, baby care products, etc.) can be considered to thank respondents for participating in your assessment. Incentives should be nominal so that participants do not feel coerced into participating.

 

Identify your team  

Identify the members of your team to help plan and conduct the assessment based on the method you selected. One or two individuals may serve multiple roles depending on your agency’s capacity.

  • Questionnaire coordinator: Responsible for the overall assessment and ensuring quality throughout training, data collection, and data entry. The questionnaire coordinator is also responsible for the delegation of data analysis and dissemination of the data.
  • Supervisor(s): Provide logistical support to the questionnaire coordinator; assist in training interviewers as needed; oversee quality assurance during data collection, including safety and confidentiality protections of questionnaire respondents; and may assist in data entry. May also develop report with data analysis personnel.
  • Survey administrators/Interviewers: Select the participants based on sampling strategy; obtain consent from the selected participants; administer the questionnaires to respondents; and ensure that the privacy and confidentiality of respondents is protected.
  • Data entry personnel: Enter the completed questionnaires into a database.
  • Data analysis personnel: Analyze the data based on the guidelines provided in the toolkit and work with the supervisor to develop the report.

 

Determine your approach based on your plans 

The toolkit provides step-by-step guidance for conducting either a streamlined or comprehensive approach to gathering information about reproductive age, pregnant, and post-partum women. The streamlined or Fundamental approach is focused on convenience sampling and is best suited to jurisdictions with limited or time-sensitive resources. The In-depth approach includes a more robust sampling strategy. This toolkit also includes 3 assessment instruments that jurisdictions can use to assess RHAD, depending on how much time jurisdictions will have with each person being surveyed or interviewed. Assessment instruments are interchangeable and can be used in either the Fundamental or In-depth approach. While the rest of the toolkit is divided into two sections based on the two tiers, you can also decide to ‘mix and match’ the approaches based on what fits best for your assessment.

Use the following table to help you decide which tier best fits your plan. The toolkit provides more in-depth information on sampling, developing questionnaires, collecting data, and analysis and reporting.

Tier 1 – Fundamental approach

Tier 2 – In-depth approach

  • You are interested in the needs for a geographic area the size of a town or city after a disaster.
  • You only have a few questions that you want to ask (would take only 3 to 7 minutes to ask all questions). This level may also be most appropriate if you are not interested in questions on sensitive topics.
  • You have limited resources (e.g., staff, time, funding) to conduct an assessment or obtain many responses. And you are not able to request additional help or funding.
  • You are only able to only ask questions of people that you have easy access to (also known as a convenience sample).
  • You are interested in a larger region’s needs after a disaster.
  • You want to use a more rigorous assessment strategy, and you have or have access to someone with a statistics or public health research background that will help calculate an appropriate sample.
  • You have access to census data, household level information of your region, and mapping technologies.
  • You have the opportunity and time to ask more in-depth questions, including sensitive questions.
  • You have multiple months to plan and collect data in the field.
  • You have or can request funds for a large-scale assessment effort (multiple data collectors, incentives, staff salary support for long-term data collection).

Check out the following planning checklists to help guide your project. Keep in mind that these checklists include steps discussed later in the toolkit.

 

  • Fundamental approach planning checklist in Appendix A.
  • In-depth approach planning checklist in Appendix B.

 

Helpful tip 1: For questions on using this toolkit, reach out to your agency’s data analyst/statistician or a health researcher at the nearest university.

Helpful tip 2: Adding questions to existing assessments (e.g., adding RHAD assessment toolkit questions to CASPER, Title V, or Title X assessments already being conducted) may help save on time and resources for implementation compared to developing a new assessment.

Acknowledgements

  • Maureen Wimsatt, PhD, MSW, Center for Healthy Children and Communities, Inc., Paid Consultant
  • Carly Raasch, MA, Center for Healthy Children and Communities, Inc., Paid Consultant
  • Valerie Goodson, MPA, Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists, Senior Program Analyst

The Reproductive Health and Disasters (RHAD) Assessment Toolkit 2.0 was adapted by Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists (CSTE) from the Reproductive Health Assessment After DisastersToolkit.

CSTE thanks the RHAD Assessment Toolkit 2.0 Workgroup, the CSTE Maternal and Child Health Epidemiology Emergency Preparedness Capacity Assessment Workgroup and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Division of Reproductive Health, Field Support Branch, Emergency Preparedness and Response Team. This publication was supported by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Cooperative Agreement Number 1 NU38Ot000297). Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

All resources and links in this toolkit were updated and active at the time of release in December 2022.

© 2025 Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists