Maintaining a Competent Public Health Workforce: Lessons Learned From Experiences With Public Health Accreditation Domain 8 Standards and Measures.

CONTEXT

Public health accreditation is an ongoing national movement to improve the quality of public health departments and the public health system in the United States; however, calls have been made for more evidence regarding best practices in the accreditation process.

OBJECTIVE

The purpose of this work is to provide evidence about best practices in the accreditation process, specifically within the workforce development domain. It is the first in-depth investigation into workforce development using data collected by Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB).

DESIGN

Using deidentified accreditation application data from PHAB, this study employs a mixed-methods approach to examining practices, lessons learned, challenges, and strategies pertaining to workforce development planning for Domain 8.

SETTING

United States.

PARTICIPANTS

US state (n = 19) and local health departments (n = 115).

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

Public Health Accreditation Board assessment scores for the workforce measures and the relationship between the health department's approach to meeting a PHAB measure criteria and the PHAB assessment score.

RESULTS

Of the 9 different approaches identified as ways of encouraging the development of a sufficient number of qualified public health workers (version 1, measure 8.1.1), only 1 approach (local health department internship programs with schools of public health; B = 0.25, P < .03) was significantly related to higher scores. An opportunity for improvement identified for measure 8.2.1 was that plans missing a clear identification of the gap between current staff competencies and staff needs were associated with a 0.88-point decrease in the 4-point score (P < .001).

CONCLUSIONS

Findings suggest that there are approaches adopted for meeting PHAB domain 8 measures that will impact the overall conformance assessment and score of a health department pursuing accreditation. There are several opportunities for improvement that health departments might consider when planning for accreditation or assessing their activities.