Health impact assessment (HIA) is a process that makes it possible to shed light on decision-making related to proposed policies, programs or projects, and on their potential effects on the health of a population. There are many approaches to the practice of HIA, the oldest having been developed within the field of environmental health in relation to the environmental impact assessment of development projects. The main focus of this inventory is the practice of HIA as related to the development of healthy public policy. This is an evolving field of practice in which more and more public health actors are becoming interested and with which they wish to become familiar.
This inventory is intended as an introduction to the field of HIA practice as applied to policy development. It is based on a review of the literature on this subject carried out by the National Collaborating Centre for Healthy Public Policy (NCCHPP) between March and July of 2008. It does not claim to be completely exhaustive, but it reflects the information available at the time the review was carried out.
Those interested in HIA will find in this inventory a body of information aimed at:
- facilitating access to existing resources
- providing information about the most effective techniques for researching HIA
- sharing knowledge about the main ideas that characterize this field.