Assessing environmental public health capacity building

The use of the national public health performance standards (NPHPS) helped set a benchmark for improving the capacity of the environmental health services at one local county health department. Results from the NPHPS were used to establish a baseline measure of how well the environmental programs could carryout the 10 Essential Services. Following the completion of the standards, efforts were focused on strengthening areas where little or no capacity was reported. Areas of focus included building a framework for improving assessment and surveillance capabilities within a countywide system of public health, developing policies and plan that focus on strengthening the environmental health status of the community, and educating the environmental public health workforce. The standards were applied again to determine improvement from the baseline measure.