Institutes in Action: Accreditation and Performance Improvement
Public health institutes (PHIs) support ongoing public health quality improvement (QI) practices and play a critical role in mobilizing and preparing health departments for national accreditation.
According to Dr. Kaye Bender, President and CEO of the Public Health Accreditation Board, "NNPHI and PHIs have been and will continue to be vital to accreditation's success. PHIs have managed state-based accreditation programs, provided strategic guidance to health departments around community health assessment and improvement planning, and served as neutral conveners to bring multi-sector partners together to address critical public health issues."
NNPHI will continue to leverage its network's capacity to prepare health departments for accreditation and engage in QI. NNPHI is pleased to showcase several examples of its member institutes' significant contributions to public health performance improvement:
Health Resources in Action: Bringing the San Antonio Metropolitan Health Department One Step Closer to Accreditation
New NNPHI Member Health Resources in Action (HRiA)—a national non-profit public health and medical research organization in Boston, MA—has been facilitating an assessment and planning process in Texas to help the San Antonio Metropolitan Health Department fulfill the pre-requisites for applying for accreditation. Having assisted with a comprehensive department assessment, HRiA is now assisting with a strategic planning process to help determine the health priorities for San Antonio; formulate shared goals and strategies for each priority; and identify community partners and resources. Learn more about how HRiA is helping the San Antonio Health Department prepare for accreditation.
Michigan Public Health Institute: Enhancing Key Resources in Quality Improvement - The Quality Improvement Guidebook
The Michigan Public Health Institute (MPHI), Office of Accreditation and Quality Improvement is the administrator of Michigan's state-based Accreditation Program and served as the lead agency during the state's participation in all six years of the Multi-State Learning Collaborative (MLC), during which MPHI developed Embracing Quality in Local Public Health: Michigan's Quality Improvement Guidebook. The guidebook utilizes real public health examples to illustrate the use of QI tools and techniques. MPHI recently received Robert Wood Johnson Foundation funding to make the guidebook—to be published in 2012—more comprehensive and include more lessons learned from health departments across the country. Learn more about how MPHI is assisting with accreditation preparation in Michigan.
North Carolina Institute for Public Health: Sharing Expertise to Inform the National Dialogue around Accreditation
Since 2004, the North Carolina Institute for Public Health (NCIPH) has served as the administrator of the NC Local Health Department Accreditation program. As an early pioneer for local public health accreditation, NC now has 61 of its 85 health departments accredited, with the remaining ones set to participate in the process by 2014, as required by legislative mandate. NCIPH Evaluation Services conducted a study of the first 48 NC accredited health departments on the impact of accreditation and benefits and barriers related to the process. Study results will benefit other states now considering national accreditation. Learn more about how NCIPH is informing the national public health accreditation movement.
Institute for Wisconsin's Health, Inc: Supporting Accreditation Preparation in Tribal Health Departments
The Institute for Wisconsin's Health, Inc. (IWHI) is working with Wisconsin's 11 federally recognized tribes to increase activity around public health QI and accreditation. IWHI organized an in-person tribal accreditation open forum in late 2010 and hosted a webinar and accreditation training in August 2011. The August training participants included teams from the Forest County Potawatomi, Ho-Chunk Nation, Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, and Oneida Nation. This group has charted a course for continued work together that includes quarterly face-to-face accreditation meetings hosted by each tribal community. Learn more about how IWHI is assisting with accreditation preparation efforts in Wisconsin.
To learn more about our members' work in Accreditation and Performance Improvement, contact Katie Dabdoub, Program Coordinator, at .