Organizational scope of practice: Assessing the primary care and public health activities of health centers and health departments in Iowa

Abstract

The objective was to understand how Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) and local health departments (LHDs) address their shared mission of improving population health by determining the scope of primary care and public health activities each provides in their community. A brief mail survey was designed and fielded among executive directors at all 14 FQHCs in Iowa, and 13 LHDs in Iowa representing counties with and without an FQHC. This survey contained a mixture of questions adapted from previously validated primary care and public health survey instruments. Using survey responses, each FQHC and LHD was given 2 scores (each ranging from 0-100) measuring the extent of their primary care and public health activities, respectively. The overall response rate was 85.2%; the response rate was 78.6% within FQHCs and 91.7% within LHDs. Overall, FQHCs had higher scores (73.8%) compared to LHDs (27.3%) on total primary care services, while both LHDs (79.3%) and FQHCs (70.9%) performed particularly well on public health services. FQHCs and LHDs in Iowa address a variety of public health and primary care issues, including but not limited to screening for chronic diseases, nutrition counseling, immunizations, and behavioral health. However, FQHCs provide a higher amount of primary care services and nearly as many public health services when compared to LHDs. In a value-based health care delivery system, integrating to improve population health is a wise strategy to maximize efficiency, but this will require maximizing coordination and minimizing duplication of services across different types of safety net providers. (Population Health Management 2015;18:137-145).