Preparing the public health nursing workforce for population-focused health improvements

Elements of the Affordable Care Act will improve access to health care but it is still incumbent upon local health departments to use preventive, population-based approaches that will shape health policy, empower vulnerable populations and ensure conditions in which all persons can be healthy. In response to economic pressures for greater efficiency and changes to our understanding of the determinants of health and illness, local and state public health leaders in Washington State developed an “Agenda for Change.” The Agenda calls for population-based and population-focused community prevention to be the focus of local public health practice. Implementing this Agenda requires a public health workforce that can assist individuals, organizations and communities in promoting health, and guide policy makers in implementing science-based policies that address health determinants. In alignment with the Agenda, nursing leaders from three local health departments in Washington, with support from the HRSA-funded KRISP (Keeping RNs to Improve and Strengthen Population Health) Project, are working systematically to evaluate the competency of public health nurses (PHN) to fill new population-focused roles and then to provide training based on the self-assessment. In this presentation, we will demonstrate our method of assessing PHN competency, how the assessment guided the development of trainings, the content of trainings, and our workforce development implementation plan. In addition, we will describe the impact of this effort on agency leadership, staff, and other neighboring health departments. Lessons learned from our efforts will be useful to session participants wanting to transform their workforce into skilled population-focused practitioners