The Harford County Health Department announced it has successfully completed a review process to maintain national accreditation status through the Public Health Accreditation Board (PHAB). The nonprofit PHAB works to advance and transform public health practice by championing performance improvement, strong infrastructure, and innovation. In maintaining its accreditation status for another five years, the Harford County Health Department has demonstrated that it meets PHAB’s quality standards and measures and has the capacity to continue to evolve, improve and advance, thereby becoming increasingly effective at improving the health of the residents of Harford County.
PHAB’s accreditation program, which receives support from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, sets standards against which the nation’s governmental public health departments can continuously improve the quality of their services and performance.
“We are so pleased to again be recognized by PHAB for achieving national standards that foster effectiveness and promote continuous quality improvement,” said Harford County Health Officer, Dr. David Bishai. “We hope this announcement, coming as it does in the midst of our rapidly unfolding public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic, will reassure our community, our partner organizations, our funders and our elected officials that the services we provide are as responsive as possible to the needs of our community. By continuing to improve our services and performance, we can be sure we are meeting the public health needs of those we serve as effectively as possible.”
The Harford County Health Department achieved national initial accreditation status through PHAB in March of 2015, under the leadership of Dr. Russell Moy, after undergoing a rigorous, multi-faceted, peer-reviewed assessment process to ensure it met a set of quality standards and measures. Today’s announcement goes a step further by demonstrating that the Harford County Health Department has the capacity to become increasingly effective at improving the health of Harford County.