CSTE Focus Group Pilot Needs Participants

CSTE is leading a scientific writing capacity assessment and is looking for epidemiologists to participate in the pilot focus groups.  The assessment objective is to assess current themes and issues that epidemiologists experience in state and local health departments surrounding formal publishing.  The pilot data collection will occur between March 10-21, 2014.

CSTE invites you to participate in the pilot focus group if:

• You are an epidemiologist (do not have to be a CSTE member);

• You work at a state or local health department;

• You can commit to participate in the 1.5 hour focus group session.

If you meet the above criteria and are interested in participating in the pilot focus group, please email Jessica Pittman at JPittman@cste.org no later than Friday, March 7th, 2014.

Fridays from the Archives: Games Galore

Friday, November 29, 2013: Games Galore

In honor of US Thanksgiving, today's Fridays from the Archives post focuses on a topic many of us encounter before or after turkey consumption: games.

Though your Thanksgiving day gaming interests may be more in the realm of American football, Timothy Dasey's 2011 presentation on EpiDIG shows how virtual games can provide an effective mental workout to supplement the physical. In Using Gaming Tools to Train Disease Surveillance Professionals and Investigate Next-Generation Capabilities, we learn the rationale behind gaming as a surveillance tool. Gaming not only allows people to hone their decision making abilities but it can also be instrumental in developing reaction strategies for events that are rarely seen and therefore difficult to prepare for.

Gaming is not sufficient for ensuring preparedness, but it has substantial potential as another tool in the arsenal of readiness. EpiDIG games are developed to supplement possible weaknesses of traditional emergency preparedness exercises, including a lack of feedback. The ability to simulate, for instance, a food borne disease outbreak, and receive direct feedback to the response and decision-making is extremely valuable to surveillance professionals. Since Dasey's presentation in 2011 MIT Lincoln Labs has continued to develop serious gaming systems and utilize them with public health practitioners (read more).

The full set of slides and recording from Timothy Dasey, PhD (October 27, 2011) can be found in 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)

Job Opening: Syndromic Surveillance Epi - IN State Department of Health

Job Title:   Syndromic Surveillance Epidemiologist

Job ID:   581393

Apply Before:   10/05/2012

Location:   Indianapolis, IN

Full/Part Time:   Full-Time

Regular/Temporary: Regular

Job Description:

This position conducts continual, timely syndromic surveillance for potential public health emergencies. This position maintains the statewide plan for the ISDH syndromic surveillance system; establishes key relationships with external agencies and local public health departments. This position also serves as the division coordinator for the Indiana National Electronic Disease Surveillance System (I-NEDSS) and coordinator for Early Warning Infectious Disease Surveillance (EWIDS). This position also supervises the Quality Assurance Epidemiologist and future Biostatistician (E7) positions and serves as a tertiary division director to assume divisional supervisory responsibilities in the absence of the division director and field epi director.

Preferred Experience:

Five (5) years of experience in epidemiology or public health; plus a Bachelor's degree in a Biological Science, Chemistry, an Environmental or Health Science, Mathematics, Nursing, Pharmacology, Public Health, a Social Science, Statistics, Toxicology, or a closely related area from an accredited college. A combination of experience and accredited graduate/doctoral education in Epidemiology and/or the areas listed may be considered.

If interested, you are encouraged to go to the job posting to learn more about this position and how to submit your application online. You may find the job posting here: http://www.in.gov/spd/2334.htm

Contact information for this job posting is below:

Thomas Duszynski, MPH

Director of Surveillance and Investigation

Epidemiology Resource Center

Indiana State Department of Health

Office 1-317-233-7009

tduszyns@isdh.in.gov

WHO Releases Interim Epi Surveillance Standards for Flu

The World Health Organization (WHO) has released Interim Global Epidemiological Surveillance Standards for Influenza for review and comment until October 31, 2012. This document contains the WHO interim global standards for influenza surveillance that have been created over the course of the last two years. Various groups have played a role in the development of these standards from around the world, each brining a unique perspective to key surveillance issues. 


A WHO Working Group on Global Influenza Surveillance Standards was assembled, convening experts from all six WHO regions. Additionally, in March of 2011, a Global Consultation on Influenza Surveillance Standards was held in Geneva. This consultation brought together epidemiologists and surveillance officers from 35 countries from all six WHO regions, each of the WHO regional offices, as well as representation from PATH, US CDC, ECDC, and WHO HQ. 


Input from this meeting provided the basis for the initial drafts of the influenza surveillance standards document. The drafts were circulated further through various groups such as the WHO Epidemiological Network, the working group, and other advisors for feedback and comments from February to April of 2012. The feedback received from the current release of the document, the interim standards, will help direct the final version, which will be produced after the comment period that ends on October 31, 2012. 


The WHO now invites you to join this process and submit your own feedback on the interim standards.

View the WHO Interim Global Epidemiological Surveillance Standards for Influenza
Submit feedback