Collaboration and joint funding: Benefits of using public health nurses as child care health consultants

BACKGROUND: Like most states, Alabama has a growing number of children in out of home care. While the state has 1372 licensed early education centers, as of 2008 only 6.8% of them are accredited by the National Association for the Education of Young children. In an effort to improve the quality of early education programs, Alabama's Department of Human Resources, the state's child care licensing organization, uses funds from its Child Care and Development Block Grant to provide child care health consultation. Through a contract with the Alabama Department of Public Health, ten public health nurses provide accurate and timely health information to early education programs through onsite and phone consultation.

PURPOSE: The purpose of the session is to describe one state's efforts to improve the quality of early education services through collaboration, shared funding, and effective use of public health resources. SIGNIFICANCE: While Alabama developed its child care health consultation system to respond to its own needs and resources, lessons from this initiative can be useful to other states.

FINDINGS: In FY08, nurse consultants visited 2482 early education centers and homes, conducted 2168 trainings for child care staff, and provided parents, providers, and community members with information, about general health and safety, infection control, and the prevention of the spread of illness. They also linked families to the SCHIP program by providing 5325 information packets. CONCLUSIONS: Alabama's collaborative approach to child care health consultation provides up-to-date, accurate health information and training to Alabama early education providers and families.