by Justin B. Moore, PhD, MS

---

If you haven’t noticed (and judging by the weather reports, you haven’t), spring is upon us! With spring comes the May/June issue of the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice, which features a number of excellent articles to inform public health policy and practice across a broad spectrum of topics. The issue begins with a number of articles focused on obesity that are highlighted in our lead editorial, including an article by Judy Jou et al. entitled, “Using Obesity Research to Shape Obesity Policy in Minnesota: Stakeholder Insights and Feasibility of Recommendations.” In this insightful article, Dr. Jou and her colleagues explore the use of evidence related to obesity policy by stakeholders in Minnesota, concluding that research is perceived as valuable by stakeholders but that time constraints serve as a barrier to the identification and utilization of relevant research evidence.

Another article of note is “The Changing Landscape of HIV Prevention in the United States: Health Department Experiences and Local Adaptations in Response to the National HIV/AIDS Strategy and High-Impact Prevention Approach.” In this article by Holly Fisher and her associates, they describe how a diverse sample of local health departments were affected by the National HIV/AIDS Strategy and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s High-Impact Prevention initiative. Their finding suggests that some jurisdictions have made progress in HIV prevention and control, guided by these national initiatives but highlight the need to closely monitor progress and share successes across jurisdictions.

In a third article of potential interest, Bekemeier and her co-authors present their estimation of the gap between the costs for foundational public health services at the local level and actual spending amounts in order to identify characteristics associated with the gap, in “Perceived Need Versus Current Spending: Gaps in Providing Foundational Public Health Services in Communities.” They find that the gaps vary widely by jurisdiction, with actual spending substantially lower than local officials’ estimates of spending needs. I would encourage you to read this article of great importance to local public health and funding policy.

Alongside this new issue, we’re pleased to present a new supplement focusing on the Impact of Public Health Accreditation. This is our fourth such special issue on the topic, and we consider it an important part of our mission to document the public health accreditation progress. Our ongoing support of the work of the Public Health Accreditation Board has resulted in a large collection of over 100 accreditation articles. For the current supplement, guest editors Kaye Bender, Jessica Kronstadt, and Les Beitsch give an overview of the impact of accreditation in their opening editorial by sharing 10 years of lessons learned. Important articles look at the QI and performance management benefits of accreditation; changes in local public health system performance before and after national accreditation to collaborative partnerships and working together for healthier, sustainable communities; opportunities for tribal public health; the impact of accreditation on workforce development; and much more.

Finally, I would like to remind potential authors of a new tool, “Writing in Boxes,” which can be found on our companion website, JPHMPDirect.com. This interactive tool, tested by members of our editorial board, guides those interested in authoring scientific articles in a step-by-step fashion. In addition, please check out our new suite of tools as part of our Author Guidelines, which include step-by-step guides for manuscript submission and guided templates to make formatting of your submission to the journal easier.

---

Justin B. Moore, PhD, MS, FACSM, is the Associate Editor of the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice and an Associate Professor in the Department of Implementation Science of the Wake Forest School of Medicine at the Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center in Winston-Salem, NC, USA. Follow him at Twitter and Instagram. [Full Bio]