WVU Department of Community Medicine offering Monthly Public Health Grand Rounds

This article appeared on Page 26 of the Jan-Feb edition of the West Virginia Medical Journal.

The Dept. of Community Medicine (CMED) at the West Virginia University School of Medicine has created a new, live and archived webcast Outreach and Continuing Education program, the Public Health Grand Rounds (PHGRs).  The lectures presented in PHGRs are designed to appeal to a wide audience of physicians, nurses, dentists, public health practitioners, pharmacists, psychologists and other health care professionals, regionally, nationally and beyond.

CMED presents PHGRs on the third Wednesday of each month.  The purpose of the grand rounds is to offer all faculty, students and public health practitioners opportunities to listen to state and national public health leaders, WVU faculty members, and guests from state and local health departments discuss current health care issues.

Instead of clinical grand rounds in which case histories are utilized and medical specialists present their views on the various aspects of a patient's status, the "patient" in PHGRs is the community and the "status" is a public health concern in the community requiring an intervention which the guest speaker presents.  Some of the goals of PHGRs are:

• To increase awareness and understanding of the National Public Health Performance Standards Program, and West Virginia's place in the program.
   
• To include presentations on threat preparedness and bioterrorism.
   
• To include presentations on new issues in public health.
   
• To promote a national dialogue on the critical nature of public health infrastructure development.
   
• To discuss the attainment of high-quality and well-organized public health services.
   
• To improve interactions among researchers, teachers, agencies and public health practitioners that will be of benefit for all groups.  A high priority for the future will be the education and field placements of students.
   
• To host combined grand rounds with the schools of medicine.

For more details, contact Rachel T. Abraham, M.D., M.P.H., or go to the OPHP website at http://www.hsc.wvu.edu/som/cmed/ophp.