CEHA 2015 Annual Education Conference & Exhibition

Attendees will participate in an interactive foodborne outbreak case study  based on a real-life outbreak in Colorado and designed to teach steps in an outbreak investigation, encourage discussion, practice decision making during an outbreak, and introduce tools and resources that can be used during an outbreak.The outbreak will require an environmental assessment and attendees will discuss the critical role of environmental health in outbreak investigations. An online training and toolkit about environmental health assessments will be highlighted. Attendees will learn about collecting human, food, and environmental specimens for testing during an outbreak. Attendees will describe and orient data in terms of person, place, and time. They will be shown examples of epidemic curves and tools to create line lists. An online resource to learn about how food products could become contaminated during growth, production, and processing will be highlighted. Attendees will select control measures to implement in the outbreak, including restricting ill food-handlers. Attendees will determine what types of communication are necessary during this outbreak.  The case study will require attendees to apply their epidemiologic knowledge and skills to problems confronted by public health practitioners daily, while being exposed to tools and resources available to them.