PHEM Officers Completed the FETP-Frontline Course
The Ethiopian Public Health Institute (EPHI), in collaboration with the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the World Health Organization (WHO), recently awarded certificates to more than 148 Public Health Emergency Management (PHEM) officers who successfully completed the Frontline Field Epidemiology Training program (FETP), where 43 from SNNP and 105 from Addis Ababa.
The certification workshops were held in Hawassa from December 25-26, 2017 for SNNPRS and in Adama from December 29-30, 2017 for Addis Ababa graduates in the presence of regional Health Bureau heads.
Dr. Feyissa Regassa EPHI’s Acting Director of PHEM explained that more than 400 public health emergency management (PHEM) officers from Woreda Health Offices, Zone and Sub-city Health Departments and Regional Health Bureaus of Addis Ababa City Administration, Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples (SNNP), Benishangul Gumuz, Gambella, Oromia and Amhara regions have been enrolled in the training program.
The graduates are expected to be able to monitor and assess the quality of public health surveillance data, analyze and interpret surveillance data regularly, prepare surveillance summary reports that is useful for public health evidence based decision-making. They are also expected to conduct case investigations or participate in outbreak investigations and communicate effectively with public health decision makers.
The basic or frontline Field Epidemiology Training Program (FETP) is three month training and started in 2016 in Ethiopia with technical and financial support from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (US CDC). FETP-Frontline designed to improve the country’s capacity to prevent, detect and respond to public health emergencies is an in-service training with mentorship program where mentors are assigned to mentor all mentees throughout the process.