Common Billing Initiative

Built on a consultant’s assessment of the billing practices of region’s 11 local health departments (covering 19 counties) the NENCPPH created an ongoing work group which has established a compendium of best practice policies and procedures to address billing and coding issues and to develop benchmarks on performance and alerts for further action. This process has helped maximize reimbursements and resulted in the creation of a best practice manual used as a resource tool and training vehicle across the region. This initiative continues through a regional work group of billing / office mangers. Policies and procedures are being developed that cover all steps of billing in the agency. Staff will continue to be trained in best billing practices and a monthly reporting package will be used as a management and performance improvement tool.

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Regional HIV Care, Prevention, and Testing Program

Regional HIV Program Partners

The Northeastern Partnership's Regional HIV Program expands the partners' capacity:

1. to deliver Primary Medical HIV care at five regional mobile care sites (Bertie, Beaufort, Dare, and Halifax Counties in the NENCPPH region and also to Lenoir County,
2. to provide nontraditional HIV/STD testing services targeting communities considered at risk (573 individuals were tested for HIV in 2007),
3. to raise awareness of HIV and provide HIV prevention education (40 outreach activities occurred in 2007).

The partnership has recently received additional funding through grants to promote and sustain this initiative through increasing staffing of a regional coordinated care team, funding two regional nontraditional testing coordinators, and funding a jail HIV/STD testing coordinator.  

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Diabetes Sentinel Project

Through this project, the Northeastern Partnership has increased its capacity to prevent, diagnose and medically manage diabetes among African Americans, and seek to reduce health disparities in the 19-county region.

Diabetes Sentinel Community Exercise Class

The Diabetes Sentinel program is a collaboration of 30 African American churches and public health providers for diabetes prevention, outreach and policy change. Each participating congregation identifies adult and youth leaders for training as lay advisors (Sentinels), creates a committee to support this effort, establishes and implements policies that promote healthy lifestyles, and sponsors workshops on diabetes, nutrition, and exercise.

The Northeastern Partnership is working toward developing church-housed Diabetes Prevention Centers in all counties in the region. The Partnership will facilitate replication of this model throughout the state.

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Touch No Tobacco – Teen Tobacco Initiative

Through this initiative the Northeastern Partnership provided prevention education and other resources in 12 partnership counties to reduce teen tobacco use. Teens participating in this program develop outreach materials and create educational campaigns for local businesses and restaurants and parks and recreational facilities in their region, developing networks of stakeholders and reinforcement for their own awareness of the impact of tobacco use. In addition, to encourage implementation of the 100% Tobacco Free School policy, the partnership has provided cessation resources, compliance assistance, and media campaigns throughout its region. This program is sponsored by the North Carolina Health and Wellness Trust Fund.

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Geographic Information System (GIS) Portal

The Northeastern Partnership is developing a Geographic Information System (GIS) portal through which spatially-related public health information can be brought together in a single site. In addition, the Partnership will develop a web-based GIS application that would enable the spatial tracking of local environmental health information to increase efficiencies and provide better service throughout the region.

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Business Insights

In conjunction with consultants, the Northeastern Partnership is currently locating business model assets that can be applied toward solving high priority public health problems and organizational challenges. These models draw on examples such as Lean and Six Sigma to map current business practices and develop teams that can look at tailoring new business practices in ways that address local public health department issues. Examples include billing practices, clinic efficiency, and client satisfaction with services at the local health department.

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Human Resources Committee

The Northeastern Partnership established the Human Resources Committee to convene, collaborate, and develop comprehensive personnel policies and recommendations to the partnership with hopes of, ultimately, improving partnership efficiency, functioning, and impact. In 2007, the committee met to discuss needed policies and contribute draft suggestions. The result of these meetings was the development of several policies to be implemented in partnership health departments. The Human Resources Committee continues to meet and develop policies as needed.

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