Evan wants to know if health types investigating outbreaks of foodborne illness – or, as it’s initially described, a lot of people barfing, go figure out why – have any training. And if so, what kind of training was offered and whether it was any good.
Evan Henke, a PhD student at the University of Minnesota (right, pretty much as shown) wants to know this info to be able to summarize the typical training and work experiences of public health 
disaster responders in the U.S.
And get his PhD.
Evan writes, “To build the evidence base of determinants of health department performance, The University of Minnesota has developed an online survey for state and local epidemiologists and environmental health professionals involved in foodborne disease outbreak response in the U.S.
“The Institute of Medicine has long recognized the need to describe the organizational and environmental determinants of public health department performance. This need is intensified in programs related to public health emergency preparedness and response, where public health activities are critical to the mitigation of and recovery from disasters.
“Foodborne disease outbreaks are regularly recurring disasters requiring public health action including laboratory testing, epidemiological investigation, environmental inspection, and regulatory product traceback.
“Several determinants of public health performance for these activities have been proposed. In focus groups conducted in 2010 by the University of Minnesota, state and local foodborne disease responders identified predictors of performance including the following:
-Size of Jurisdiction
-Disease Reporting Laws
-Program Budget
-Organizational Structure
-Surveillance Processes
-Staff Training
-Staff Experience in Similar Disaster Response
-Inter-Professional Relationships and More
“If you are an epidemiologist or environmental health professional, please consider reviewing the survey consent and participating at the link below. The survey will require 15-20 minutes.”
https://live.datstat.com/DCSS-Collector/Survey.ashx?Name=FOBOS_Survey_1
This survey has been approved by The University of Minnesota Institutional Review Board (Study 1110E05746). If you have questions about the survey, please contact Evan Henke, PhD candidate at The University of Minnesota, at henk0071@umn.edu.