Academic Health Departments

Academic Health Departments are relationships between health departments and academic units, Kansas University Medical Center. This relationship creates a link between rising health professionals and health departments who may benefit from services (e.g. Community Health Assessments) academic units can provide. Academic public health departments are akin to the idea of "teaching hospitals" in the sense that it allows future public health practitioners to gain experience in the field while also serving health departments in need of capacity.

Together, both KUMC and health departments can:

• Expand upon research for public health,
• Help Deliver Essential and Foundational public health services
• Grow the future professionals in public health.

Since 2013, KUMC faculty have been deeply involved in a long-term academic health department with Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health. These partnerships can support the following:

• Advancement of population health policy, system, and environmental change
• Capacity building among the current and future public health workforce
• Collaborative research aimed at contributing to the evidence base of what works in public health