Northern Nevada Public Health: Utilizing the Public Health Workforce Calculator and Workforce Capacity Self-assessment Tools to Develop a Framework for Workforce Investment.

Context: Health departments nationally are critically understaffed and lack infrastructure support. By examining current staffing and allocations through a Foundational Public Health Services (FPHS) lens at the Northern Nevada Public Health (NNPH), there is an opportunity to make a strong case for greater investment if current dedicated full-time equivalents are inadequate and to guide which investments in public health workforce are prioritized.

Objective: To assess the use of the Public Health Workforce Calculator (calculator) and other tools to identify and prioritize FPHS workforce needs in a field application.

Therapeutic Value of Sentinel Lymph Node Biopsy in Patients With Melanoma: A Randomized Clinical Trial.

Importance: Sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsy is a standard staging procedure for cutaneous melanoma. Regional disease control is a clinically important therapeutic goal of surgical intervention, including nodal surgery.

Objective: To determine how frequently SLN biopsy without completion lymph node dissection (CLND) results in long-term regional nodal disease control in patients with SLN metastases.

Estimating Public Health Workforce Efforts Toward Foundational Public Health Services.

Context: The Foundational Public Health Services (FPHS) include a core set of activities that every health department should be able to provide in order to ensure that each resident has access to foundational services that protect and preserve health. Estimates of the public health workforce necessary to provide the FPHS are needed.

Objective: This study assessed the potential use of an FPHS calculator to assess health department workforce needs.

Public Health Graduates and Employment in Governmental Public Health: Factors That Facilitate and Deter Working in This Setting.

Objectives: Previous surveys of public health graduates examine where they work; however, little is known about public health graduates' employment decisions or the factors that facilitate interest or deter interest in working in governmental public health settings. The purpose of the current pilot study was to build on the information previously collected in graduate surveys by expanding questions to undergraduates and asking about decisions and factors that influence choices of employment.

Methods: A pilot survey of graduates of public health programs was conducted.

The Relationship Between Health Department Accreditation and Workforce Satisfaction, Retention, and Training Needs.

Background: To improve quality and consistency of health departments, a voluntary accreditation process was developed by the Public Health Accreditation Board. Understanding accreditation's role as a mediator in workforce training needs, satisfaction, and awareness is important for continued improvement for governmental public health.

Objective: To compare differences in training needs, satisfaction/intent to leave, and awareness of public health concepts for state and local health department staff with regard to their agency's accreditation status.

Perceptions of Public Health 3.0: Concordance Between Public Health Agency Leaders and Employees.

Context And Background: The newest era of public health, deemed "Public Health 3.0," supports cross-sector collaborations to address social determinants of health. These activities often require collaborations with nontraditional public health entities.

Has Voluntary Public Health Accreditation Impacted Health Department Perceptions and Activities in Quality Improvement and Performance Management?

Context: The Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB) is now in its 10th year, making it an ideal time to study the impact of PHAB accreditation on local health departments (LHDs).

Objective: To examine whether applying for PHAB accreditation affects perceptions and activities regarding quality improvement (QI) and performance management (PM) within LHDs.

Design: Data from the National Association of County & City Health Officials' 2010, 2013, and 2016 National Profile of Local Health Departments and associated QI modules were linked to PHAB-applicant data collected in e-PHAB in a cross-sectional and longitudinal approach examining self-reported QI/PM activities.

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).

National Voluntary Public Health Accreditation: Are More Local Health Departments Intending to Take Part?

Objective: This article examines local health department (LHD) participation and intentions to participate in national voluntary accreditation and reasons for not seeking accreditation. Specifically, it compares the results of national surveys among LHDs in 2010, 2013, and 2014.

Design: Longitudinal cohort study.

Practitioner perspectives on foundational capabilities.

Context: National efforts are underway to classify a minimum set of public health services that all jurisdictions throughout the United States should provide regardless of location. Such a set of basic programs would be supported by crosscutting services, known as the "foundational capabilities" (FCs). These FCs are assessment services, preparedness and disaster response, policy development, communications, community partnership, and organizational support activities.

Turning point revisited: launching the next generation of performance management in public health.

A decade ago, the Turning Point Performance Management Excellence Collaborative (Turning Point) developed the first public health-specific performance management (PM) system, with accompanying resource materials, assisted by the Public Health Foundation. Since then, dramatic advancements in PM and quality improvement activities have occurred in public health. Public Health Foundation gathered data that revealed Turning Point was still relevant but difficult to implement within public health.

Driving a public health culture of quality: how far down the highway have local health departments traveled?

Context: There has been an extensive investment in building public health organizational capacity to improve performance and prepare for accreditation. An evolving perspective has focused not only on the practice of quality improvement (QI) within the health department but also upon the extent the culture of QI is embraced within the agency.

Objective: No studies have examined the current national baseline of QI culture implementation, nor estimated the degree of QI sophistication local health departments (LHDs) have attained.