The Buhl Regional Health Foundation has announced it will be creating a Community Health Task Force for Mercer County.

According to a release from BRHF, Mercer County ranks among the worst in Pennsylvania for health outcomes - #58 among 67 counties.

The ranking, BRHF says, is based off of statistics relating to obesity, smoking, premature deaths, and poor physical activity. 

Further, the Pennsylvania Department of Health says that Mercer County ranks below average in deaths related to chronic lower respiratory diseases, Alzheimer's and diabetes and the county is also ranked poorer than the state average in cases of many types of cancers, chickenpox, giardiasis, arthritis, COPD, heart attacks, heart disease, influenza, pneumonia and nephritis/nephrosis.

The new Community Health Task Force, convened by BRHF, aims to help solve those issues.

The Task Force is made up of a wide array of doctors and medical executives, and aims to develop a solution to the county's poor health rankings. A complete list of the Task Force's six members is below:

  • Dr. Beth Piccione, CEO, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Horizon & Jameson
  • Dr. David Tupponce, Senior Vice President of Institute Operations at Allegheny Health Network
  • Bob Rogalski, President, Sharon Regional Medical Center
  • Dr. George Garrow, CEO, Primary Health Network
  • Sarah Genet, CEO, Sharon Community Health Center
  • Jennifer Barborak, Executive Director, Buhl Regional Health Foundation.

"We are especially grateful for the leaders of the healthcare organizations serving Mercer County who are working collaboratively to understand and address ways to help make our communities healthier," shared Dr. George Garrow, CHTF member and CEO of Primary Health Network in Sharon.

The task force says its goal is to get Mercer County into the top 25% of counties in PA in terms of overall health and health outcomes.