Public Health Accreditation

What is Public Health Accreditation?

Public Health Accreditation is a voluntary process through which public health departments demonstrate their commitment to quality and performance by meeting national standards that ensure they provide essential public health services in their communities. The Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB) is the accrediting body for public health in the United States. 

You can learn more about PHAB here: https://phaboard.org/

The Lowell Health Department is proudly working towards Public Health Accreditation!

What are the Benefits of Accreditation?

Some benefits of public health accreditation include:

  • Stimulating quality improvement
  • Improving accountability and transparency
  • Improving the capacity of the department to provide high quality programs and services
  • Strengthening the health department's relationship with key partners
  • Helping the health department use health equity as a lens for identifying and addressing health priorities
  • Increasing the extent to which the health department uses evidence-based practices
  • Strengthening the utilization of resources

... and more! To learn more about public health accreditation and its benefits, please see the documents below:

→Benefits of Public Health Accreditation

→Public Health Accreditation Value and Impact

Accreditation Team

While achieving accreditation is a department-wide effort, our Accreditation Team is Lisa Golden (Director of HHS), Nicole Chauncey (Public Health Nurse Manager), and Hayley Williams (Community Health Coordinator). We are working with a public health consulting firm to guide the process.

Community Health Assessment and Community Health Improvement Plan

Developing a Community Health Assessment and Community Health Improvement Plan (CHA-CHIP) is an essential step of the accreditation process.

A community health assessment (or CHA) is a comprehensive picture of a community's current health status, factors contributing to higher health risks or poorer health outcomes, and community resources available to improve health. A community health improvement plan (or CHIP) is a long-term, systematic effort to address public health problems based on the results of community health assessment activities and the community health improvement process.