Description:

David’s placement is at the street health center working with the Hepatitis C team. Most of his work consists of updating the treatment database and completing a research report on the treatment of Hepatitis C in injection drug users within a community clinic setting. This report will be submitted for publication in the Canadian Journal of Gastroenterology. In addition to this, David is writing a newsletter for the Hepatitis C group and helping to organ­ize events such as the World Hepatitis C day health fair and regular visits to Kingston prisons for Hepatitis C awareness.

Description:

Maria is carrying out an evaluation of Ontario beach water quality over time and by beach location, using a microbiological, GIS and statistical tool kit, for the assessment of overall beach water quality and the geospatial distribution of beach water quality. She will also be comparing two methods to detect water contaminating indicator organisms; the traditional cell culture method and the newer QPCR method. Specifically, Maria will be comparing plate growth of E. coli and enterococci to QPCR for 2012 beach water, and discussing implications for public health (i.e. affects on park closures, or possible GI infections).

Description:

From 2005 to 2009, participation in social networking sites, including Facebook, more than quadrupled. Social media is expected to continue its upward trend of usage, and reach more individuals, transcending all age demographics. The Ottawa Public Health Family and School Health Team is taking advantage of this new information dissemination opportunity by launching its own Facebook page aimed at Ottawa parents of children and youth aged 0-18. The targeted launch date is mid-August 2012. Before the page can be launched, a literature review regarding parent outreach engagement activities through social media is required, and a needs assessment to gather information and opinions from Ottawa parents about desired messaging channels and message content must be conducted. This will include a survey. Steven will be involved in this innovative project during his summer practicum. The information gathered through the literature review and needs assessment will enable the Family Health Team to make evidence-based decisions and plan appropriate messaging strategies through the proposed parenting Facebook page.

Description:

Mutiat is currently completing a practicum in Limbe Cameroon. She is undertaking two different projects in conjunction with Cameroon Public Health and AIDS Free Africa (ngo). The first project is an assessment of health status, and determinants of health, for school children in the Limbe school system. This will include questionnaire development, visits to local schools, observation and data collection, data analysis, development of recommendations and presentation of findings. Mutiat will also be involved in a second project that aims to identify sanitation and hygiene issues among restaurant and food vendors in the city. She will also have the opportunity to spend time shadowing clinicians at a local hospital, and three small health clinics or centres.

Description:

The Healthy Weights Approach applies a diversity and health equity lens to public health practice. It is essential to embed the concept of "body diversity and health" within this approach as a way of achieving good health for all, while minimizing stigma, prejudice and discrimination based on weight, body shape or size. When possible, these services incorporate multiple health promotion strategies, with a wide range of audiences, across different settings. Yaso’s project will investigate best available research evidence related to obesity prevention using the process of Evidence Informed Decision Making (EIDM). This involves: 1) Defining the question by developing an efficient search strategy using PICO (Population, Invention, Comparison, and Outcome); 2) Searching for evidence using levels and sources of public health evidence; 3) Appraising the quality of evidence using Health Evidence tools; 4) Interpreting findings. And; 5) Assessing applicability and transferability within Toronto.

Description:

Katherine is involved in two separate projects focused on injury prevention in children and fall prevention in older adults. The first project is to develop a 3-year strategic framework for Niagara Region Public Health to effectively address fall prevention among older adults that includes education and policy components. This will help guide the region's objective to reduce falls by 2.3% in the next three years, following the Ontario Public Health Standards. The second project involves updating and revising Niagara Region Public Health's 'Safe at Home' booklet to reflect current childhood injury prevention best practices of anticipatory parenting, prioritizing fall prevention messages and reflect clear health language concepts.

Description:

Debra is working with the Research Directorate at VAC and specifically with Dr. Jim Thompson on developing a framework for describing aspects of Canadian Veteran population health. This framework will contribute to a current project of the Directorate, which will combine literature review and data analysis to describe the desired aspects. Debra is also engaging with other components of the project. Aspects of knowledge translation will be involved as the target audience will not necessarily be researchers, and the report ought to be easily accessible.

Description:

Gurleen is completing her practicum at the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care in the Public Health Programs and Policy Branch. She is leading the development of a comprehensive database of commercial food handler training and certification courses offered in Ontario. The completed database will reflect the extent to which courses offered by private institutions meet provincial and national guidelines. Using this information, Gurleen will contribute to the development of policies creating uniform food handling standards across Ontario’s 36 health units. She is also part of the working group that will guide health units in upgrading their food handler training and certification courses.

Description:

Rachelle’s practicum with the Heart and Stroke Foundation focuses on creating an advocacy training workshop for volunteers regarding effective applications for Spark Together for Healthy Kids grants. There is also a focus on planning and delivering CPR training events, “Lunch & Learn” presentations to workplaces, as well as community presentations. Rachelle is working towards creating partnerships with immigrant organizations and the Aboriginal population within Kingston, Brockville, and Belleville. Overall, the placement provides familiarity with the functioning of a health-related NGO, knowledge translation and presentations, and how to encourage community involvement in partnerships and events.

Description:

Kara’s practicum project expands on the work of Lilian Kisanga, who completed her MPH thesis on domestic gender-based violence against women in Kibosho, Tanzania. Lilian surveyed 418 married (or separated/widowed/divorced) women living in Kibosho (a rural village near Moshi) on their beliefs, experiences, and circumstances relating to gender-based violence in their families. Kara is developing a survey to determine the beliefs, experiences, and circumstances with gender-based violence of married (or separated/widowed/divorced) men living in Kibosho. An additional main objective outside of the research is to experience public health in East Africa and get exposure to the public healthcare system.

Description:

Paula is working with KFL&A Public Health on a Pubic Health Information Management System. She is working with the Emergency Preparedness team to create scenarios for the use of the tool, evaluate the components and overall tool using a surveillance framework, make suggestions after key informant interviews for improvement of the tool and develop slide deck for presentation purposes.

Description:

Energy Check is a school-based health promotion program designed by the School Health Team that focuses on promoting optimal nutrition and healthy body image to grade 10 students. In 2011, a Queen’s University MPH student performed a literature review and determined that the format and method of delivery could be altered to become a series of classroom sessions. In addition, the staff of the School Health Team has been assessing the impact of its grade 7 and 8 body image program, Body Wize, and has developed recommendations to guide its revision. For her practicum, Meghan is taking further steps in the situational assessment of these health promotion programs by performing an Assessment of Context for Body Wise and Energy Check according to KFL&A Public Health’s Program Planning Framework. This includes assisting with the development and analysis of results of a teacher-targeted feedback survey and conducting a PESTLE and SWOT analysis of stakeholder input. The results will be synthesized in a Situational Assessment report.

Description:

Kristi is carrying out an evaluation of drinking well water quality at the Kingston Public Health Ontario Laboratory, using a microbiological, GIS and statistical tool kit, for the assessment of microbial determinations and the geospatial distribution of contamination. Levels of E. coli and total coliforms in drinking water wells will be assessed, together with microbial source tracking of human and livestock sources, followed by geospatial analysis and clustering statistics.

Description:

Carina is currently completing a practicum at the Middlesex-London Health Unit with the Reproductive Health Team. She is working independently and collaboratively, to: 1) Develop (and begin implementation, if time allows) an evaluation plan for a program offered by the RHT; 2) Plan and begin work to identify priority populations in London-Middlesex (in relation to reproductive health); 3) Participate in RHT’s population health promotion planning processes, particularly related to physical activity/healthy eating for preconception/pregnant populations, and; 4) Work to develop communication campaign related to preconception health.

Description:

The Sparking Life Niagara program is being piloted at two high schools in the Niagara region this academic school year. The program aims to improve learning and academic achievement of identified at-risk youth through daily physical activity. The program is being evaluated to draw conclusions about program outcomes and effects along with identifying recommendations for future uptake of the program. Working along with Public Health Ontario and Niagara Public Health, the evaluation has multiple components including both quantitative and qualitative data analysis such as conducting stakeholder interviews or performing t-tests for matched-pair data to check for significant differences pre and post intervention (which MPH students will remember from their statistics class of course)! Following the evaluation, Arlinda will do a tool revision analysis and come up with suggestions and recommendations to improve the current resources that are being used. The results of the evaluation will be used to apply for a Planning Grant in an effort to bring together experts to help come up with a much more rigorous evaluation design for the program.

Description:

Kristen’s practicum focuses on assessing the Community Support Services (CSS) provided to the elderly population within the South East LHIN. This will help identify the strengths and gaps in service provision. She conceptualizes the trajectory of health status of the elderly in order to identify the appropriate care to match their needs and avoid service duplication. The guiding principles of this project are: appropriate, cost efficient, timely, sustainable and equitable access care for seniors. The end result of this project will be to have a logic framework that will demonstrate the way the CSS sector makes an impact on senior’s well being in alignment with the South East LHIN’s Alternatives to Emergency room strategy (ER/ALC strategy).

Description:

The focus of Naeema’s practicum is on program evaluation and surveillance. She will: 1) Prepare provincial health indicator reports (from the RRFSS Provincial Sample Pilot Project) by age, gender and health units that fall above and below the provincial average; 2) Develop knowledge exchange materials to highlight key findings and comparisons with other data sources such at the census and CCHS, and; 3) An evaluation of the school immunization program in order to learn more about how to reach parents and gain consent for immunizations for Hep B, HPV and Menactra

Description:

The issue is alcohol use-related harms among high school students to be addressed through the delay of early initiation of alcohol use among elementary school-aged children. Delaying the age of onset is a key harm reduction strategy for health promotion. The goal of Kendra’s practicum is to develop a program including messaging and resources that can be delivered to elementary students to delay alcohol initiation. The situational assessment will include assessing stakeholder perspectives (eg. students, teachers) through focus groups, interviews and a review of the literature. Addressing the issue of social norms related to alcohol use is also included.

Description:

Vanessa is working with the Somerset West Community Health Centre (SWCHC) to undertake a Community Health Needs Assessment as part of the ongoing business and strategic planning cycle for the organization. Through this process, she will undertake a systematic collection and analysis of data about the health needs of the population in the centre’s catchment area. Vanessa is working with Centre staff, partners and stakeholders to identify questions that need to be answered, determine how information will be collected, identify existing sources of data, collect data, conduct a comprehensive analysis of the data and present the results of the health needs assessment in a report. The scope of the needs assessment exercise will align with the organization’s main goals: improve access to quality primary health care, improve prevention and management of chronic disease, focus on health promotion and community development and continuing to advocate for healthy public policy.

Description:

Working with her preceptor, members of the WHO Disability and Rehabilitation team, staff at regional offices as well as experts around the world, Sarah’s practicum activities primarily focus on Community Based Rehabilitation (CBR) in the Arab region and globally. She is conducting a situation analysis on the development of CBR in the Arab region, supporting the launch of the WHO CBR guidelines (Arabic version) and assisting in the planning of a three-day workshop in Jordan. Also, Sarah will be developing an interest group within the Arab region to promote CBR. At a more global level, she is supporting the organization of the 1st CBR World Congress that will take place this fall in Agra, India. Sarah is also assisting the Disability and Rehabilitation team at the WHO headquarters with other activities as required.

Description:

Danika is working on the Needle Exchange Program (NEP) with the Communicable Disease Team at HPECHU. She is performing a needs assessment to determine how the program can better reach the intended population. She is conducting key informant interviews with local service providers (i.e. addictions services, police, methadone clinics, etc.) to assess how the program can better tap into the current trends and patterns of drug use among local injection drug users. Danika wants to determine if local service providers and their clients are aware of the program and gather their ideas on how to improve it. She will also be conducting a survey of the current NEP sites to assess the needs and supports surrounding the NEP. Danika hopes to gain information regarding the improvement of data collection around users of the program. She will be developing recommendations describing how to better reach the service user population and how to meet the identified needs of the current NEP sites.

Description:

Lily is working on the analysis and interpretation of harm reduction data using SPSS and Excel as well as compiling research ethics applications and supporting documents for alcohol harm reduction project in BC. Lily is working closely with all members of the harm reduction team and its provincial partners to evaluate the impact and/or effectiveness of harm reduction activities/programs, engage in the analysis and interpretation of health surveillance data, promote and deliver preventive messaging to high-risk groups, and participate in qualitative analysis on various data aspects of harm reduction. In order to better understand the importance of engagement of people who use drugs in planning, policy, research and evaluation initiatives – during the practicum there will be meetings with “user groups” and the ability to visit InSite (supervised injection site) and services.