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Postal Code

The question:

At the hub, when youth are provided the sociodemographic questionnaire the question they receive related to postal code is:

Rationale for this question:

• Postal codes can be used to address and analyze health data and identify health inequities.  
• Collecting postal code information can help to paint a clearer picture of where young people are coming from when accessing services.
• With this information, we are able to compare data collected at the hub to local, regional, and census population data to understand more clearly which populations are being overserved, underserved, and excluded.

Important considerations:

• Young people be might hesitant to answer this question for fear of judgment of where they live, or fear of the hub trying to establish contact with their home situation. Ensure young people the rationale for this question and remind them that the information they choose to provide, will not affect their quality of service.
• If a young person is hesitant to provide their full postal code, there is also the option to ask for first three digits of postal code. This can make young people feel a bit more comfortable. The collection of the first three digits of postal code have shown to provide very useful information at the sub municipal level in larger urban areas.

Responding to youth asking why they are being asked this question:

By collecting postal code, we are able to understand what regions and/or neighborhoods young people are coming from when accessing our services. This can help for future planning and help us identify gaps in who our hub is serving.