Back to Annual Meeting Page		American Public Health Association 133rd Annual Meeting & Exposition December 10-14, 2005 Philadelphia, PA

Abstract #113811

Jack A. Brown, RS, BA, MPA, Preventive Medicine Public Health, University of Kansas School of Medicine-Wichita, 1010 N Kansas, Wichita, KS 67212, 316 293 1837, jbrown4@kumc.edu

Public safety and environmental concerns resulting from hazardous materials releases in Sedgwick County, Kansas lead to an increased role for environmental health professionals to provide technical support. Since 1981 the Wichita-Sedgwick County Division of Environmental Health (WSCDEH) has served as an advisor to emergency personnel in hazardous material incidents. Emergency responders and environmental health professionals agreed to mutually dedicate personnel, equipment, and other resources to respond to incidents involving hazardous materials culminating in a formal inter-local agreement in 1990. Through this partnership, environmental health professionals participated in the planning and development of the Hazardous Materials Incident Response Team. Moreover, environmental health professionals defined their role as providers of technical assistance and support for hazardous materials incidents throughout the county. In the past decade this role has evolved to include the WSCDEH participation in the Metropolitan Medical Response System, terrorism and all hazards preparedness activities with involvement in approximately 100 incidents annually. WSCDEH has played a critical role in incident response for more than two decades and is a valuable resource to the community. Many environmental health staff have specialized training, educational backgrounds in the physical sciences, knowledge of environmental regulations, experience in conducting inspections, epidemiological investigations and expertise in the use of monitoring and detection equipment. Looking forward, plans have been implemented to expand the use of GIS and geocoding systems for incident response management. The WSCDEH model serves as an example of environmental health's role in hazardous materials response, terrorism and all hazards preparedness.

Learning Objectives:

• Describe planning and development strategies for addressing public safety and health issues relating to hazardous materials incidents and terrorism preparedness.
• Identify examples of organizational relationships between environmental health professionals,emergency responders and the Metropolitan Medical Response System.
• Recognize how envionmental health professionals can apply public environmental health investigative techniques to provide technical support, monitoring and sampling resources in the field.
• Identify equipment that can be utilized in the field to provide real-time monitoring and analysis of hazardous materials, biological and chemical agents.
• List some of the future techniques for incident management such as GIS mapping and geocoding.

Keywords: Environmental Health, Environmental Health Hazards

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

I wish to disclose that I have NO financial interests or other relationship with the manufactures of commercial products, suppliers of commercial services or commercial supporters.

Recorded presentation