The goal of the Public Health Accreditation Board’s (PHAB) national accreditation program is to improve and protect the health of every community by advancing the quality and performance of public health departments. An important part of receiving accreditation status will include demonstrating the use of quality improvement (QI) within a health department. Many local health departments (LHDs) understand the basic concepts of QI but struggle with how to incorporate it into the culture of their workplace. NACCHO’s next webinar, entitled “Building a QI Culture at a Local Health Department,” will feature one LHD’s story of working towards such a culture. Three speakers from the Sedgwick County Health Department in Kansas will provide insight into: 

• building an organizational culture that embraces QI
• the importance of integrating QI into organizational culture
• the development of a QI plan and using it to guide efforts throughout the agency
• movement from discrete QI initiatives to the adoption of organization-wide QI
• challenges, strategies for success and measures of success for achieving a culture of QI within a local health department

Speakers include:

• Claudia Blackburn, Health Director
• Sonja Armbruster, Community Health Assessment Coordinator
• Ty Kane, Community Health Analyst