RTI International Launches Online Platform for Public Health Professionals to Share Quality Improvement Experiences

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C. — RTI International, with funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, recently launched an online resource for public health professionals to share results and lessons learned from quality improvement initiatives, www.phqix.org.

The Public Health Quality Improvement Exchange is a free, publicly available communication platform dedicated to enhancing the performance, effectiveness, and efficiency of public health systems by making public health quality improvement information easily accessible to public health practitioners.

The platform was designed in collaboration with state, local, and tribal health department representatives. It houses descriptions of the expanding number of public health quality improvement efforts in a standardized format so practitioners and others can find real-world examples relevant to their current and planned quality improvement work.

To encourage interaction and collaboration between public health professionals, the website includes a community forum for dialogue among the site’s users, the ability to comment on and pose questions about quality improvement initiatives, and an “Ask an Expert” feature where quality improvement experts weigh in on questions posed by site users.

“We expect this new online resource to be a dynamic destination for health departments and their partners to learn and share best practices for quality improvement,” said Pamela Russo, senior program officer at the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

“Throughout the design process, we were deeply engaged with the public health practice community,” said Jamie Pina, research scientist at RTI International and the director of the project. “The features of the site reflect the input of public health practitioners at every step.”

About the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation focuses on the pressing health and health care issues facing our country. As the nation's largest philanthropy devoted exclusively to health and health care, the Foundation works with a diverse group of organizations and individuals to identify solutions and achieve comprehensive, measurable and timely change. For 40 years the Foundation has brought experience, commitment, and a rigorous, balanced approach to the problems that affect the health and health care of those it serves.  For more information, visit www.rwjf.org.