| About
the Kitsap
County Health District
Our Mission:
"Striving
to make Kitsap County the healthiest place on
the planet to live, work, and play."
The Kitsap County Health District
was organized as a full-time public health agency
in 1943. For over sixty years, we have strived to
protect and promote the health of Kitsap County residents
by preventing and controlling disease, injury, disability,
and premature death. A ten-member Board of Health,
composed of county and city elected officials, supervises
the policy and budget of the Health District.
Leadership is provided by a four member Executive
Management Team composed of:
Scott
W. Lindquist, MD, MPH
Director / Health Officer
lindqs@health.co.kitsap.wa.us
Scott
Daniels, MS, RS
Deputy Director
danies@health.co.kitsap.wa.us
Suzanne
Plemmons, MN, RN, CS
Community Health Director
plemms@health.co.kitsap.wa.us
Jerry
Deeter, MS, RS
Environmental Health Director
deetej@health.co.kitsap.wa.us
The Kitsap County Health District is composed of three
major divisions working to ensure a safer and healthier
community:
Community
Health Division: Provides disease prevention,
family planning and health promotion services to individuals,
families and the population at large. These services
are provided in health district clinics, home visits,
schools, and a variety of other community settings.
Environmental
Health Division: Consists of five major
programs: Solid & Hazardous Waste; Drinking Water;
On-site Sewage, Water Quality; and Food Safety & Living
Environment. The foundation for these programs are
Federal, State and local regulations established to
ensure a healthy and safe environment for all Kitsap
County residents. Education, rather than enforcement,
is the preferred method for attaining these protections
to preserve our quality of life now and into the future.
Administrative Services Division:
Includes personnel, accounting, information technology,
and janitorial staff providing administrative support
to all agency staff. This also includes staff in our
public health assessment and emergency preparedness
and response programs.
WHAT IS PUBLIC HEALTH?
Public health is an essential service guaranteed to
all residents by Washington State law. From drinking
water safety and restaurant inspections, to tobacco
use prevention, to disease prevention and control,
the work of public health is to help communities to
be safe and healthy. Public health prevention efforts
have been responsible for 25 years of the nearly 30-year
improvement in life expectancy at birth in the United
States since 1900.
How is "public
health" different from "health
care"?
Health care focuses on delivering services to the
individual to treat illness and maintain
health. Public health focuses on helping communities
to be safer and healthier. For example, doctors treat
individual patients for a specific disease or injury,
usually providing medical care only on a part-time
basis, namely, when the patient is ill (e.g., treating
a patient with an E. coli infection). Public health
professionals, on the other hand, monitor and respond
to the health concerns of entire communities
and promote healthy practices and behaviors to assure
that our populations stay healthy (e.g., responding
to an E. coli outbreak in the community and working
to prevent future outbreaks). Health care and public
health work together to ensure individual and community
well being.
What do public health agencies
do?
The work of public health can be summarized in three
categories:
- Essential programs for
improving health: Programs such as immunizations,
communicable disease prevention, and chronic disease
and injury prevention help individuals and communities
stay healthy.
- Information that works:
Educational and training programs on everything
from infant mortality to healthy aging, information
on community health trends, and statewide health
and safety information provide individuals and communities
with information they can use to make good decisions.
- Protecting you and your
family every day: Services such as drinking
water and recreational water quality monitoring,
septic system inspections, restaurant inspections,
hazardous waste control, disease prevention and
planned community crisis response ensure individual
and community health and safety.
Who benefits from public health
services?
Many people associate public health with health care
services for low-income people, but this is false.
Public health services cover all people in
Washington. Everyone benefits from services like drinking
water safety, restaurant inspections and communicable
disease prevention and control.
Who oversees public
health services in Washington?
Washington has 35 local public health agencies that
provide services and make decisions at the local level.
Statewide organizations like the Washington State
Department of Health and the State Board of Health
work to monitor health trends, develop public health
policies, and coordinate a statewide response to communicable
disease outbreaks and epidemics of chronic diseases
and injuries.
How is public health
funded?
Public health services are funded by a combination
of local, state and federal dollars. Primary funding
decisions are made by local county commissioners,
the Washington Legislature and the United States House
of Representatives and Senate.
How do people use
public health services?
People use public health services everyday-services
like food and drinking water safety-without even realizing
it. Other services, such as immunizations, family
planning information, injury prevention education
resources, and information on community health trends
are available from the Health District in every community.
About The Kitsap County Health
District
56K
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(Windows Media 9 Video)
Our Programs:
The Health District provides a wide range of programs
to protect and promote public health including:
AIDS
Services
Assessment
Public Health Emergency Preparedness and Response (PHEPR)
Birth
Certificates
Breast
& Cervical Health
Breast
Feeding Support & Education
Business
Pollution Prevention
Childhood
Immunizations
Children
with Special Health Care Needs
Communicable
Disease Control
Death
Certificates
Drinking
Water
El
Centro de la Familia
Environmental
Health
EnviroStars
Family
Planning
Food
Handler's Cards
Food
Safety
Hazardous
Waste
Health
Promotion
HIV
Screening
Immunizations
Indoor
Air Quality
Injury
Prevention
Living
Environment
Needle
Exchange
Parent
Child Health
Parenting
Pool
Inspections
Pregnancy
Services
Pregnancy Tests
Public
Health Nurse Home Visits
Rabies
Information
Refugee Screening
Rodent
Control
School-Based
Clinics
Sewage/Septic
Tanks
Sexually
Transmitted Diseases
Shellfish
Solid
Waste
Swimming
and Spa Pools
Tobacco
Prevention & Control
Travel
Immunizations/Consultations
Tuberculosis
Program
Water
Quality of Environmental Waters
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