The state of Missouri department of health quality improvement project for non-intoxicating beverages

摘要

For many years the State of Missouri has had laws in place mandating that all facilities manufacturing and/or distributing non-intoxicating beverages be licensed annually to help ensure the safe consumption of beverages throughout the state. The Missouri Department of Health has been charged with the responsibility of implementing the licensing program. An evaluation of Missouri's Non-Intoxicating Beverage Licensing Program revealed that approximately 50 percent of all non-intoxicating beverage manufacturing and/or distributing facilities servicing our state have been operating without a valid license. As a result of that finding, a quality improvement team was organized and assigned the task of determining inadequacies of the state licensing program and developing a plan to address the problems. The primary problems were determined to be the lack of program organization, the lack of defined program policies and procedures, inadequate facility tracking methods, and the use of inadequately designed license applications. As a result of the quality improvement team review, corrective measures have been initiated to improve the overall effectiveness of the state licensing program. The State of Missouri Department of Health, like many other state health departments, is mandated by state law to license and regulate a variety of facilities to ensure public safety. It is our intention to relay to other governmental organizations how our state worked to build a comprehensive licensing program, to further our food safety initiatives undertaken to protect public health.