Emergency response plan. Both in laboratory collaboration and in teaching, the UW already hasan extensive working relationship with the 6 northwestern states that will serve as the WWAMI RCE'sframework for information dissemination, training and laboratory emergency response coordination. TheWWAMI RCE is already well integrated with federal response plans in the region and nationally. Thenew USPHS Regional Health Administrator for Region X, CAPT Patrick O'Carroll is the most activeAffiliate Associate Professor in the UW/SPHCM. He is now responsible for overall coordination of thepublic health response to bioterrorism in the region. Dr. O'Carroll previously set up CDC's Health AlertNetwork (HAN) to coordinate emergency communication between the federal government and state andlocal health agencies in the country. Before moving to the Region X position in 2003, he spent 4 of thelast 6 years as a full-time CDC assignee to UW's NWCPHP to work specifically in the northwest regionand to help set up the pioneering public health informatics research and training program at UW(http://phig.washington.edu/). Dr. Oberle, the Associate Dean for Public Health Practice at the UWSchool of Public Health coordinates collaborations with state and local institutions and organizations forthe WWAMI RCE in addition to the UW School of Public Health. As an example of the UWcollaboration with federal, state and local partners, UW last year hosted Washington State'spharmaceutical stockpile dispensing exercise, the first such state drill in the country after the anthraxepidemic. At the drill held on the UW campus, 269 'patients' exposed to anthrax were registered,evaluated, and treated using supplies from the National Pharmaceutical Stockpile. The exercise hasresulted in two publications in presswith UW, state and local emergency response authors [26, 27].The UW/NWCPHP has a network of 6 state public health training coordinators that meet quarterlyand convened the first joint meeting with the 6 states' HAN directors and the 6 state bioterrorismpreparedness coordinators. In addition, the UW/NWCPHP under the direction of Prof. Jon Counts,former director of the Washington State Public Health Laboratory, has a project with the public healthlaboratory directors in the 6 states to improve infectious disease laboratory practice. This group beganmeeting in 2002 and communicates via a newsletter and listserve and comprises the coordinators ofCDC's Laboratory Response Network in the region for integration of laboratory surge capacity inmanaging laboratory specimens. The WWAMI RCE will interact with this group to determine whichfacilities at the RCE would be useful to Public Health Laboratories for surge capacity or specializedtesting such as molecular characterization of strains, which include DNA sequencing, mass spectrometryprotein characterization, and the genomic evaluation of strain similarity. At the local level in Seattle-KingCounty, Dr. Jeff Duchin is both the director of the infectious disease control program at the Seattle KingCounty Public Health responsible for bioterrorism response and is an Assistant Professor at UW in bothMedicine (Infectious Diseases) and Epidemiology. Dr Duchin communicates almost daily with InfectiousDisease clinicians throughout the state on issues of public health interest and he is a personal friend of theDirector and Associate Director of the RCE.Immediately after the award of the WWAMI RCE grant, the investigators will utilize the nextquarterly meeting of the 6-state network to evaluate other potential partners, and establish a plan to definea regional research role for the WWAMI RCE to assist in the response. The RCE Directors and Dr.Oberle will attend the regular quarterly meetings of the 6 state networks and they will keep the six-statenetwork informed of the RCE research and infrastructure capability. In the event of a biodefense oremerging infectious disease emergency the Directors will be available to assist Dr. Patrick O'Carroll andother federal and state officials as necessary. The Directors will be available on a 24-hour basis by beeperand cell phone to assist in a response.Directors in case of an emergency.
Showing the most recent 10 out of 247 publications
