Question

This week's topic: The Government's Role in Health Care

1. Discuss the role that state and local health departments have in health care.

2. Identify the services that are provided by both the state and local health departments.

3. Use the internet to look up the state and local health departments in your state. Provide an overview of what they do.

Answer 1

answer-

the role of state and LHD is very important in health care.The state's basic legal authority in matters of health derives from the sovereign powers reserved to the states under the United States Constitution..APHA recommends that each state organize, finance, and staff its own health department to the end that state departments of health will possess not only the statutory authority they need, but will enjoy as well the authority of recognized competence for fulfilling their growing complex roles in securing the public health.The Association of State and Local Health supports a division of responsibilities between state and local health agencies under which the state agency is responsible for setting statewide health policy and standards, while most of the actual health services are provided locally.

LHDs have serious and urgent needs for preparing new public health professionals and for upgrading the skills of current public health professionals (NACCHO, 2001). They face an on-going need to train new and current workforces in how to respond to emerging areas, changing diseases, new priorities, and new technologies. Because LHDs are experiencing significant changes in the types of services they provide and the roles they are expected to fulfill, education and training are needed to prepare new and current local public health staff to meet these changing expectations.

LHDs provide a significant amount of direct staff training, primarily for focused technical skills specific to their services and programs. Most LHDs have very limited financial and staff resources for providing or obtaining training or for supporting education for their staff, and they rarely have staff who are professionally prepared to be trainers or educators. Linkages with schools of public health could enhance the capacity of LHDs to provide broader and higher quality training.

Many sources of education and training are currently available for local health department staff, including state government agencies, professional organizations, academic institutions, federal government agencies, consultants, other local government agencies, and in-house training (Bialek, 2001).

Local health department staff offer practical experience that could be of value in the education of public health and other health professionals. Available information suggests that staff and faculty exchanges are not currently a major collaborative activity between local health departments and academic institutions for health professions. LHD staff and academic faculty might benefit substantially from programs allowing them to spend significant time in such activities. Many LHDs have indicated that they would be interested in having department staff placed in faculty appointments (Bialek, 2001).

Services provided by these departments-

Assessment of health needs in the state based on statewide data collection.

Assurance of an adequate statutory base for health activities in the state.

Establishment of statewide health objectives, delegating power to localities as appropriate and holding them accountable.

Assurance of appropriate organized statewide effort to develop and maintain essential personal, educational, and environmental health services.

Provision of access to necessary services.

Solution of problems inimical to health.

Guarantee of a minimum set of essential health services.

Support of local service capacity, especially when disparities in local ability to raise revenue and/or administer programs requires subsidies.

Technical assistance, or direct action by the state to achieve adequate service levels.

In United states, these state and local departments they provide medical, technical, professional assistance to health care organizations, In most states, particularly in the West, local public health agencies are usually units of local government. In about one-quarter of the states, nearly all of the local agencies are units of state government and are accountable to the state health department director.

Local, state, and federal public health agencies form the backbone and the infrastructure for the public health system in the United States, and the workforce of these agencies is an essential component of that infrastructure. Public health professionals in these agencies, as well as in other organizations, must be appropriately educated to perform effectively. They must have the competencies necessary to serve as the frontline deliverers of public health services to diverse communities. They must be able to respond to rapidly changing needs, priorities, and technologies. They must have the knowledge and skills necessary to work effectively with many different disciplines, communities, and organizations. They must have an ecological perspective, grounded in the fundamental skills of public health.

Educating public health professionals to function effectively and to respond to the new and emerging challenges requires funding support. There is an old saying, “You get what you pay for.” If we want high quality public health professionals, contributing through practice, teaching, and research to improved health in our communities, then we must be willing to provide quality support to the education of those professionals.