The Accreditation Quality Improvement Process

The Michigan Departments of Community Health (MDCH), Agriculture (MDA), and Environmental Quality (MDEQ) and Michigan’s 45 local health departments are committed to providing strong, effective local health programs, services, and care for Michigan citizens.  Because an efficient, valuable, and credible accreditation process is fundamental to effecting that commitment, in December 2002, the Michigan Local Public Health Accreditation Commission recommended that the Michigan Departments of Community Health, Agriculture, and Environmental Quality commence a structured process for accreditation quality improvement.  In January 2003, the on-site review component of the accreditation program was paused, in part, to enable stakeholders to focus on the improvement initiative.

AQIP Vision and Principles:

In improving the quality of programs, services, and care provided to the public, stakeholders recognized that improvement options must be congruent with the mission and goals of the Accreditation Program. Additionally, improvement mechanisms should enhance or preserve the gains achieved through the current accreditation process and recognize that rule, regulation, and statute based Minimum Program Requirements (MPRs) are the crux of the accrediting tool. The improvement process seeks to:

• Increase the real value of accreditation to accredited local health departments
• Increase external customer, local health department staff, and state agency satisfaction
• Respond to local health departments’ reduction in state funding levels
• Respond to local health departments’ role in reacting to urgent/emergent public health issues

AQIP Workgroup:

In March 2003, an Accreditation Quality Improvement Process (AQIP) Workgroup was organized and convened in collaboration with the Michigan Association for Local Public Health (MALPH). The locally-driven, 14 member AQIP Workgroup comprises 10 representatives from local health, 3 from state agencies, and 1 from the Michigan Public Health Institute (MPHI). Collectively, their charge is to provide leadership and direction for accreditation quality improvement. Specifically, the workgroup’s primary goals are to:

• Ensure that improvement activities engage all key stakeholders
• Identify opportunities for process improvement
• Determine which improvement opportunities will have the most positive impact on stakeholder satisfaction
• Develop recommendations based on priorities
• Develop recommendations for ongoing process improvement

AQIP Survey:

The AQIP Workgroup recognized that improvement requires an understanding of “what” to improve and “how” to improve.  To engage stakeholders and listen to the voice of the local health community the workgroup developed a survey focusing on key accreditation process components. 

AQIP Survey Final Report 
    • Executive Summary
    • Analysis of Survey Responses
    • Appendix A (Survey Methodology)
    • Appendix B (Survey Results-All Respondents)
    • Appendix C (Survey Results-Local Public Health Department Respondents)
    • Appendix D (Survey Results-State Agency Reviewer Respondents)
    • Appendix E (Open-Ended Response Coding)
    • Appendix F (Survey Instrument: Includes Summary Statistics of all Close-ended Responses & Full Text of All Open-ended Responses)

AQIP Final Recommendations (PDF)   

AQIP Implementation Cover Letter and Report (presented at the March 2004 Commission meeting)

MDCH Local Health Services Accreditation Supplemental Report (May 2004)

2nd AQIP Implementation Report (presented at the December 2004 Commission meeting)

Boilerplate Workgroup's Final Report

A-G Workgroup's Final Report (MS Word; if a dialogue box appears requesting a password, simply click "Cancel")