Supporting and improving local public health through quality improvement

Michigan has a long standing Local Public Health Accreditation Program, which recently added a series of standards related to quality improvement (QI). The added standards mirror the Public Health Accreditation Board's (PHAB) Domain 9. In an effort to better understand the degree to which local health departments believe they can meet these standards, and to identify major barriers and needs, the Michigan Public Health Institute's, Center for Healthy Communities, in partnership with the Michigan Department of Community Health conducted a survey in the fall of 2010. Results suggested that most local health departments have one or more programs with QI plans in place and a process in place for collecting customer satisfaction information. However, most local health departments indicated they do not have an agency wide QI plan or an established ongoing QI process. Additionally, local health departments were able to identify the major barriers they faced, as well as supports that would be helpful. Local health departments that participated in the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Multi-state Learning Collaborative (MLC) or other QI-focused national initiatives indicated higher levels of preparedness than local health departments who had not.