Youth Friendly Care Certification

Strengthening Providers in their Care Delivery for Teens and Young Adults

Young people want high quality, inclusive, age appropriate and culturally relevant health care that centers their needs and experiences and to engage with health systems that are:

  • Trustworthy, safe, and inclusive

  • Non-judgmental and compassionate

  • Responsive to young people’s needs

  • Transparent about health concerns and confidentiality

  • Supportive of ongoing youth engagement in improving healthcare services

To do this work, the Department of Health (DOH) is working closely with teens and young adults, state agencies, and community partners to plan a new Youth Friendly Care certification. This program is designed for medical and behavioral health clinics and practices that serve youth. 

What is the Youth Friendly Care Certification?

In response to young people’s feedback, DOH is teaming up with partners, teens, and young adults in Washington to develop a Youth Friendly Care Certification that will launch in June 2025. The certification recognizes and designates youth-serving medical and behavioral health clinics or practices that are committed to supporting, promoting, and enhancing youth friendly care practices aligned with DOH’s youth-defined criteria in four focus areas:

  • Welcoming Environment: Create physical and online spaces that are welcoming, warm, and youth-centered, and are inclusive, promote privacy, and are accessible to people with all types of abilities.  
  • Positive Interpersonal Interactions: Ensure staff and providers interact and communicate with young people in ways that emphasize the comfort, well-being, needs, and agency of young patients.
  • Confidentiality and Minor Consent: Prioritize and protect young people’s understanding of and ability to exercise their rights to privacy, confidentiality, and confidential services. 
  • Essential Knowledge and Training: Integrate provider training and policies that ensure substantive and equitable health care delivery to young people. 
What does certification mean for your organization?

Certification means you're taking steps to provide equitable, youth-centered care and services in the four areas of focus.

In return for your commitment, certified practices and clinics will be officially designated as Youth Friendly Care certified and will receive window decals and graphics to demonstrate designation, free support and technical assistance on youth friendly care, and will be listed on DOH’s Teen Health Hub WA webpage.

In addition to becoming more youth friendly, this certification will help your health care practice:

  • Increase mental and behavioral health screening among teens and young adults
  • Increase access to and use of well-visits among teens and young adults​ 
  • Improve access to preventive care and riskier behavior screenings and assessments for teens and young adults
  • Increase access to support, training, and technical assistance for youth serving medical and behavioral health providers and clinics
  • Ensure young people have access to safe and inclusive youth centered care
Why youth friendly care matters

Equitable, accessible, and youth friendly care is essential for adolescent health. Young people need support from trusted adults to guide them through important health and sensitive discussions, provide and educate about preventive care, and identify riskier behaviors that require more support.

Teens and young adults may see a variety of providers that address their different health needs in different environments, including private practice, school-based health clinics, community health centers, or their local/ government health departments. Young people experience barriers in the healthcare systems, including privacy concerns, the need for culturally relevant or sensitive care, lack of age-appropriate communication, and feeling dismissed or not taken seriously.

How can my clinic or practice become certified?

We recognize that every practice or clinic that wants to participate is starting from a different place when it comes to youth friendly care. Using a strengths-based approach, any medical or behavioral health clinic or practice can become Youth Friendly Certified. Certification requirements are flexible and consider capacity, ability, funding, locale, and experience.

There are three main steps to becoming Youth Friendly Care certified:

  1. Meet the eligibility requirements. To apply, clinics and practices must:

    • Provide relevant medical or behavioral health services to teens or young adults, for example, primary care, family medicine, pediatric care, family planning, school-based health, mental health services, or substance use treatment

    • Demonstrate a commitment to sustaining youth friendly care from clinic or practice leadership and youth-serving providers

    • Designate a "champion" to complete the application, participate in meetings and communities of practice for DOH, and engage youth-serving providers and staff in improvement activities

  2. Complete an application: Beginning in June 2025, applicants who meet all three eligibility requirements can complete an online application highlighting their current youth friendly practices, successes, challenges, and areas for improvement within each domain. Stories, photos, and testimonials from youth and partners are encouraged. Applications will be reviewed and scored by DOH staff using a rubric defined by experts and youth. Based on the determined level of readiness, clinics and practices will be certified in one of the following tracks.

       Certification Tracks

           Track 1: Beginning our journey of youth friendly practices

           Track 2: Strengthening our existing youth friendly practices

           Track 3: Recognizing well-established youth friendly care

   3. Certified clinics will be able to access supports, tools, and trainings to enhance their youth friendly practices.

 

Post certification requirements 

Certified clinics will be required to regularly engage with young people to ensure their care and practice continues to be youth friendly, and post youth-serving provider biographies online for young people to access. DOH may require certified clinics to periodically recertify. This step will help clinics showcase their commitment to providing youth friendly care, including any improvements or movement to the next track.

  • Periodically recertify to showcase commitment to improving to provide youth friendly care, and/or improvement and movement to the next track.

What do I get if I am Youth Friendly Care certified?

Youth Friendly Care certified clinics will receive access to the following supports to enhance or sustain their youth friendly practices:

  • Listing on DOH’s Teen Health Hub WA as a certified clinic or practice

  • Invitation to community of practice of other certified clinics and practices

  • A curated list of free training on adolescent and young adult health topics, many offering free continuing education credit

  • First to know about DOH resources for youth friendly care, including explainer videos and How To guides for teens and young adults, and tools made just for adolescent health providers, like the University of Michigan Adolescent Health Initiative’s SPARKS trainings and University of Minnesota’s TALK tools

  • Support with youth engagement, including a youth satisfaction survey managed by DOH and regular feedback from the DOH Youth Advisory Council on teen and young adult health topics

  • Technical assistance from DOH and other state agencies on confidentiality for confidential services, including confidential workflows, posters and tools for young people, and billing support

  • Free promotional materials to showcase your certification, including window decals, digital graphics, stickers, and posters

 

Want to get involved or learn more?

We are hosting an information and feedback session for youth-serving medical and behavioral health providers, administrators, and staff on Wednesday, February 19. For your convenience, we are hosting two sessions: 7 a.m. and 12 p.m. Both sessions will cover the same information.  

Use this Zoom meeting link to join us and share with your colleagues.

If you have any questions or need more information, contact Alexis Bates at alexis.bates@doh.wa.gov