Accreditation
What is Public Health Department Accreditation?
Accreditation is the measure of health department performance against nationally recognized, evidence-based standards set by the Public Health Accreditation Board or PHAB. These standards are based upon the 10 Essential Public Health Services (image below). PHAB promotes the advancement of public health practice by motivating health departments to improve performance, maintain a skilled workforce, and foster innovation.
The Bullitt County Health Department received its accreditation status in 2016 and is one of only 369 accredited health departments across the nation (there are over 3,000 total).
What are the Benefits of Accreditation?
PHAB accreditation encourages quality improvement, enabling our health department to better serve our community. We consistently work to identify opportunities for advancement, strengthen partnerships, maintain resources, and enhance services to improve and protect the health of Bullitt County residents.
For more information, visit www.phaboard.org
.png)
Community Health Assessment & Community Health Improvement Plan (CHA/CHIP)
A community health assessment (CHA) gives organizations comprehensive information about the community’s current health status, needs, and issues. This information can help develop a community health improvement plan by justifying how and where resources should be allocated to best meet community needs.
Benefits include:
-
Improved organizational and community coordination and collaboration
-
Increased knowledge about public health and the interconnectedness of activities
-
Strengthened partnerships within state and local public health systems
-
Identified strengths and weaknesses to address in quality improvement efforts
-
Baselines on performance to use in preparing for accreditation
-
Benchmarks for public health practice improvements
A community health improvement plan (CHIP) is a long-term, systematic effort to address public health problems based on the results of community health assessment activities and the community health improvement process. A plan is typically updated every three to five years.