THE SANDY CHILD AND FAMILY HEALTH STUDY
The damage caused during Superstorm Sandy in 2012 was immediate, but the aftershocks for New Jersey residents continue in the form of enduring health, economic, environmental and social impacts. To better understand these effects, the New Jersey Department of Health has supported a joint research team to conduct the Sandy Child and Family Health (S-CAFH) Study, one of the largest disaster recovery projects and assessments in the region.
Read all the work we have done below.
OVERVIEW
The Sandy Child and Family Health Study (S-CAFH) is a research project funded by the State of New Jersey in order to understand the effects of Hurricane Sandy on the health and well-being of children and adults, the ongoing needs of affected residents, and how well people and households are recovering.
Modeled upon the longitudinal Gulf Coast Child and Family Health Study (G-CAFH), this study adds to a unique body of disaster recovery research in the United States.
S-CAFH is a multi-center partnership of academic researchers from the Rutgers University School of Social Work, New York University’s College of Global Public Health, Columbia University’s National Center for Disaster Preparedness, Colorado State University’s Center for Disaster Risk and Analysis and our Population Impact, Recovery, and Resilience team. The study has been carried out in consultation with a New Jersey Public Partnership Group composed of officials from the NJ Department of Health, the NJ Department of Children and Families, and the NJ Department of Human Services.
METHODS
The strategic objectives for the S-CAFH study were two-fold: (1) to create a study sample of 1,000 households representative of residential areas within New Jersey exposed to Hurricane Sandy, and (2) to have sufficient numbers of cases within the sample for sub-group analyses that can be conducted of “high” damage versus “not high damage” areas, “northern” versus “southern” regions, and households with low income versus all other income levels. Addressing the first objective enables us to estimate population-level impacts and needs across the hardest-hit areas of the state. Addressing the second objective enables us to examine the extent to which New Jersey residents’ decisions, needs, health effects, and recovery may be explained by the damage they were exposed to, by regional differences, and by access to economic resources. To accomplish the study objectives, we defined an area within New Jersey that was exposed to the storm (referred to as the “S-CAFH Disaster Footprint”), and developed a multi-stage stratified sampling design to yield sufficient numbers of cases for sub-group analyses. Sampling and post-stratification weights were developed and applied to the data once sampling and data collection were complete.