Staying Certified in Public Health: Using a Theory of Planned Behavior Framework to Increase Maintenance of Certification

Certification in the public health workforce is key to professionalizing public health. However, professionals who are certified in public health (CPH) are allowing certification to lapse by failing to report earned public health continuing education (PHCE) credits. As a result, the National Board of Public Health Examiners (NBPHE) is not able to track continuing education of the public health workforce or to ensure that their public health knowledge remains current and within standards of best practice. To address this problem and increase rates of maintenance of certification, a sequential quantitative, qualitative action research study was designed using the theory of planned behavior as the theoretical framework. Implementing an intervention that was designed following the principles of the endowed progress effect, recently certified CPH certificants were invited to participate in the intervention, which trained participants to report PHCE and then offered one PHCE credit for completing the training. After the intervention was implemented, the CPH certificants were asked to complete a theory of planned behavior questionnaire. The questionnaire participants were divided into two study groups and independent measures t-tests were conducted to determine if participants who had completed the intervention displayed greater intention to maintain certification and higher rates of PHCE reporting. Individuals displaying the highest intention were then interviewed and profiled to further contextualize the results of the questionnaire. The study group that participated in the intervention demonstrated higher intention to maintain CPH certification and reported a statistically significant higher number of PHCE credits.