Silver Spring, MD, Feb. 25, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) is pleased to announce this year’s recipients of the Newborn Screening Systems Quality Improvement (QI) Projects award. Funded through a cooperative agreement with the Genetic Services Branch of the US Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), these awards will provide funding to support continuous quality improvement (CQI) initiatives led by state and territorial newborn screening programs.
In addition to funding support, awardees of the Newborn Screening Systems Quality Improvement Projects participate in a multidisciplinary collaborative network focused on improving newborn screening. They will receive customized coaching and technical assistance on designing and implementing their quality improvement project; support around data and reporting; and opportunities to disseminate their projects to other members of the newborn screening community.
A total of seven project proposals from seven different agencies were selected to participate in the second cohort of the QI projects, with many focused on popular topics including newborn screening timeliness, implementation of new disorders, patient and provider education, and improvements to results reporting. Although each program has identified a unique project, all awardees have the shared goal of improving their state or territorial newborn screening program in order to improve health outcomes for newborn babies. The selected agencies include:
- Arizona State Public Health Laboratory
- Connecticut State Department of Public Health
- Kansas Department of Health and Environment
- Michigan Department of Health and Human Services
- Nevada Newborn Screening Program
- North Dakota Newborn Screening Program
- Wisconsin Department of Health Services
This is the second cohort of awardees. The Newborn Screening Systems Quality Improvement Projects collaborative is now supporting the work of 21 unique continuous quality improvement projects from 19 state and territorial newborn screening programs.
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This program is 100% funded through Cooperative Agreement # UG8MC31893 from the Health Resources and Services Administration. All publications and presentations are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of HRSA.
The Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) works to strengthen laboratory systems serving the public's health in the US and globally. APHL's member laboratories protect the public's health by monitoring and detecting infectious and foodborne diseases, environmental contaminants, terrorist agents, genetic disorders in newborns and other diverse health threats.