IMED Abstract Deadline: July 1st

Dear Colleague,

Take note: The IMED 2014 ABSTRACT DEADLINE is on JULY 1. That is only one week from now!

Plan now to attend the International Meeting on Emerging Diseases and Surveillance - IMED 2014 this coming October 31-November 3 in Vienna, Austria, http://imed.isid.org, and I encourage you to submit one or more abstracts https://esociety.netkey.at/isid/imed/abstractsubmission describing your work related to emerging diseases so that you have an opportunity to present your work.

There will be opportunities for both poster and oral presentations.

Now established as a fixture for those whose work deals with threats from infectious agents, IMED 2014 will once again bring leading scientists, clinicians and policy makers to Vienna for a forum where those working in diverse specialties and diverse regions can meet, discuss, present and challenge one another with findings and new ideas.

Please contact info@isid.org if you have any questions about IMED 2014 or abstract submission. I look forward to meeting you in Vienna!

Best regards,

Larry Madoff

Chair, Scientific Program Committee

Editor, ProMED-mail

NACCHO – PHII Webinar this Monday, June 23rd “Building Informatics Capacity Through Workforce Development”

Please join NACCHO and PHII this Monday, June 23rd for an exciting webinar on building informatics capacity in local health departments through workforce development!

UPCOMING WEBINAR JUNE 23 BUILDING INFORMATICS CAPACITY THROUGH WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT

Title: Building Informatics Capacity through Workforce Development
Date: June 23, 2014
Time: 3:00- 4:00 PM EDT
Join: Reserve your Webinar seat now: http://naccho.adobeconnect.com/wfdev2014/event/registration.html

Description:
The challenges to building the informatics capabilities of public health agencies are many and varied. A common challenge is related to workforce development activities to recruit, select, hire, train and retain individuals that have the combination of skills and competencies needed by informatics professionals. Some of these challenges are related to establishing competitive salaries, finding individuals with the appropriate skill sets and distinguishing between IT and Informatics positions, skills, knowledge and abilities.

The webinar presentation is intended to:

• Increase awareness of common workforce related challenges to building informatics capability.
• Increase awareness of products and resources that are available to assist local health agency staff to develop informatics position descriptions.
• Provide an opportunity to hear how your colleagues have addressed informatics challenges in their organizations.

In 2013, CDC sponsored an opportunity that supported NACCHO and the Public Health Informatics Institute (PHII) to develop useful tools to assist public health agency staff to address of these issues. As an emerging discipline, the resources to assist public health agencies to establish informatics capacity at an agency level were limited. The partners established a process to draft, review and create example position descriptions for public health agencies to utilize within their organizations to establish informatics positions. These included sample position descriptions for the executive, management, clinical, and professional levels, and a brief description of a professional career ladder that describes the various positions for professionals that seek further career growth. A cross-walk document that links informatics competencies to tasks and duties was also created to assist agencies to develop position descriptions for various types of informatics jobs.

Fridays from the Archives: Ahmedabad Heat Action Plan

Friday, June 13, 2014: Ahmedabad Heat Action Plan

Last week, the ISDS Global Outreach Committee hosted a webinar on the Ahmedabad, India Heat Action Plan that was developed after a particularly deadly heat wave in the area in 2010. Dr. Dileep Mavalankar (Public Health Foundation of India) presented on the swift action he took following the 2010 heat wave.

The presentation focused first on the effects of the heat wave, including both the increased morbidity and mortality. Then, Dr. Mavalankar described how he developed the Heat Action plan for the area, how it was implemented, and what it contains. There are practical suggestions (i.e., wear light-colored clothing) and early warning systems (with color-coded alert levels). The plan has an important focus on building the capacity of emergency staff, such as ambulance staff and emergency room workers.

This webinar provides important information and suggestions for mitigating the effects of heat-related illness, which are especially valuable as we enter summer in the northern hemisphere. To learn more about this webinar or to review the recording please see the ISDS webinar archive.


This post is part of the series Fridays from the Archives. You can access all posts in the series here.

Written by Becky Zwickl, MPH, ISDS Public Health Analyst (bzwickl@syndromic.org). 

3RD GRF ONE HEALTH SUMMIT 2014 5 – 8 OCTOBER 2014 DAVOS - SWITZERLAND

The 3rd GRF One Health Summit 2014 will take place from 05 - 08 October 2014 at the Davos Congress Centre in Davos, Switzerland. (http://onehealth.grforum.org/home/)

The Global Risk Forum GRF Davos invites you to submit an abstract for oral presentation, for a poster presentation, or for a session on one of the conference topics. A particular focus will be set on Global Health, Diseases and Disease Control, Environment and Health Impacts, Food & Agriculture, Global Change & Sustainable Development.

Submit your abstract here or copy and paste this URL into your web-browser: http://onehealth.grforum.org/programme/call-for-abstracts/

The upcoming 3rd GRF One Health Summit 2014 aims to develop an international research and education strategy for One Health and to further develop and strengthen the One Health paradigm and its global movement as a trans- and inter-disciplinary approach.

In particular this 3rd global gathering will focus on the added value of a global One Health approach and a stronger involvement of the private sector and policy. For further details, we refer to the conference website http://onehealth.grforum.org.

2014 ISDS Conference: Call for Abstracts

Abstract submissions are now being accepted for presentation at the 2014 International Society for Disease Surveillance (ISDS) Conference to be held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, December 10-11, 2014. The theme for this year's conference— Public Health Surveillance - Challenges and Solutions for the Road Ahead— will highlight key challenges voiced by the public health surveillance community, and include strategies for incorporating the latest approaches, methodologies, and results into data-driven practices, programs, and policies. Submissions that address the conference theme, especially novel approaches for addressing surveillance challenges as well as the effective translation of evidence into surveillance practice are encouraged.

The ISDS conference is the premier annual scientific gathering for researchers and practitioners involved in biosurveillance. The conference attracts individuals from public health, epidemiology, health policy, biostatistics and mathematical modeling, informatics, computer science, and related fields focused on biosurveillance and emerging challenges to public health practice.  The 2014 ISDS Conference will feature internationally renowned speakers from health departments, leading academic institutions, government agencies, international health agencies and top industrial organizations.

The 2014 Scientific Program Committee is seeking abstracts that focus on automated or timely collection of pre-diagnostic or diagnostic data from clinical information systems to inform infectious disease, chronic disease, and injury public health surveillance; near-real-time surveillance to support early event detection, event characterization, case finding, clinical decision support, hypothesis development, situational awareness, or evaluation of public health interventions; and development of methodologies that provide flexible tools to complement traditional surveillance systems and registries.

Abstracts accepted for presentation at the 2014 ISDS Conference will be published in a special supplement of the Online Journal of Public Health Informatics.

For more information, please visit the ISDS website.