Discussion: View Thread

------------------------------
Gelilawit Tamrat MS
Program Analyst, Informatics
National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO)
Washington DC
(202)800-3713
------------------------------

Hello all!

Alicia Nelson here from St. Mary's County Health Department in Maryland. All of our information systems are quite antiquated and we are beginning the process to evaluate what our needs are to come up with a data modernization plan of our own. We need improved systems across all operations from HR, Fiscal, Inventory Mgmt to Behavioral Health and other clinical services. We also need improved method to gather and report data on our programs as well as community impact of vaccine uptake, infectious diseases, etc. I look forward to learning from the group!

------------------------------
Alicia Nelson
St. Mary's County Health Department
Leonardtown MD
(301)885-8971
------------------------------

Hi! My name is Mindy Allen and I am the Nursing Supervisor over the Cincinnati (Ohio) Health Department's Communicable Disease Unit. My favorite dessert (if I must pick ONE) is probably white chocolate! Informatics in our health department is mostly managed by our epidemiologists and IT team and we use a combination of an EHR and state databases to store information. 

------------------------------
Arminda Allen
Cincinnati Health Department
Cincinnati OH
(513)357-7338
------------------------------

Good morning! My name is Megan Hanley, and I am the Epidemiologist at the Tazewell County Health Department in Central Illinois. My favorite dessert is probably a homemade apple pie. 

Informatics at our health department is definitely in the developing stages. Currently, we use our state databases to receive information and then do analysis in Microsoft excel. That process is rather cumbersome because of the age of the state's databases. As a smaller health department, I am the only staff person working with or manipulating data and am looking forward to learning from this group. 

------------------------------
Megan Hanley
Tazewell County Health Department
Tremont IL
(309)929-0281
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 12-22-2023 02:43 PM
From: Arminda Allen
Subject: Introductions

Hi! My name is Mindy Allen and I am the Nursing Supervisor over the Cincinnati (Ohio) Health Department's Communicable Disease Unit. My favorite dessert (if I must pick ONE) is probably white chocolate! Informatics in our health department is mostly managed by our epidemiologists and IT team and we use a combination of an EHR and state databases to store information. 

------------------------------
Arminda Allen
Cincinnati Health Department
Cincinnati OH
(513)357-7338
------------------------------

Hi!!

My name is Maria Torres and I am the Health Equity Coordinator for Pottawattamie County Public Health. My favorite dessert hands down will have to be ice-cream 🤤

Informatics in our department is still on it's beginning stages we are a semi-new established county public health. Working on what would be the best way on collecting data. I look forward on learning from the group :D 

----------------------------------------------------------

Maria F Torres (She/Ella)

Health Equity Coordinator

Public Health

223 South 6^th Street | Council Bluffs, IA 51501

P: 712.242.1155 | EXT: 1122|

C: 712.828.2064

PottCounty-ia.gov

------------------------------
Maria F Torres (She/Ella)
Health Equity Coordinator
Pottawattamie County Public Health
223 South 6th Street | Council Bluffs, IA 51501
P: 712.242.1155 | EXT: 1122|
C: 712.828.2064
PottCounty-ia.gov
------------------------------

Hi all, 

My name is Jen Young, I work as a Communicable Disease Epidemiologist at Thurston County Public Health and Social Services here in Washington State. My favorite dessert would be lemon bars. Informatics in our department is in the rebuilding stages after COVID-19 with lessons learned and turn over. I look forward to learning from the group to improve our practices. 

Best, 

Jen Young, MPH, CPH (She/Her)

Communicable Disease - Senior Epidemiologist

Thurston County Public Health and Social Services

412 Lilly Rd. NE. Olympia, WA 98506

Phone: 360-688-4504

Email: jennifer.young@co.thurston.wa.us 

Fax: 1.833.418.1916

------------------------------
Jennifer Young
Lead Epidemiologist
Thurston County Public Health and Social Services
Olympia WA
(360)867-2500
------------------------------

Hi everybody - My name is Tommy George and I supervisor the Epidemiology program within the Public Health Informatics & Planning Division at the Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department in Lincoln, Nebraska. My favorite dessert is probably chocolate chip mint ice cream, but honestly anything with mint probably. Informatics in our department is a collaboration between our epidemiology team, the information systems specialists (IT/GIS) in our health department and city-county IT departments. We use a software called LogiXML, which is kind of like Tableau, to build our dashboard systems. We try to use our informatics to streamline how we do reporting for the general functions of assessment (Community Health Assessment primarily) and our support for evaluation of programs throughout the department. I look forward to learning more from all of you!

------------------------------
Tommy George
Public Health Epidemiologist
Lincoln-Lancaster County Health Department
Lincoln NE
------------------------------

Hello from Mountain Maryland!

My name is John Corbin (he/him), and I am the Communications, Data Science, and Informatics Administrator at the Garrett County Health Department in Maryland's westernmost county.

Currently, our local health department is continuing to innovate along the digital transformation arc that began in our county around 2016 with our first "modern" Community Health Assessment. There are a number of outstanding challenges when it comes to antiquated systems (particularly when working across counties), as Alicia mentioned, but we are excited and energized about ongoing efforts to develop and expand informatics practices!

Dessert? Well, that would have to be fluffy lemon sour cream cookies!

------------------------------
John Corbin BS Business Administration
Informatics Administrator
Garrett County Health Department
Oakland MD
(301)334-7700
------------------------------

Hi Everyone,

My name is Susan and I work as a Public Health Nurse in our Communicable Disease Division at Winnebago County Health Dept. in Wisconsin. Our department is looking into ways to incorporate data modernization (e.g., different programs to utilize versus spreadsheets for things) which many times our Epidemiologist is involved in as well as IT at times. However, the term informatics is a bit more vague to people I feel. I recently graduated with my master's in clinical and health informatics but found that people were not as familiar with that term. As for my favorite dessert I think it truly depends on the day.

Have a good day,

Susan

------------------------------
Susan Sattler
Public Health Nurse
Winnebago County Health Department
Oshkosh WI
(920)420-8149
------------------------------

Hi all!

My name is Lillian Jensen and I am affiliated with the Kent County Health Department in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I am currently working with Kent County as a private contractor to complete a data modernization project that we started during my MPH practicum (I graduate in April!). 

My project is about accelerating data into action in Kent County. I am building an automated data management pipeline which pulls surveillance data from the state's (rather old) surveillance systems, cleans and preprocesses it, then pipes the data into a Power BI dashboard. At the end of my contract we hope to have the dashboard up and running on the county webpage. 

Moving forward, I am interested in applying my data science background in local public health, so this feels like the right place for me!

As for my favorite dessert, my spouse makes a boozy chocolate mousse that is to die for :)

------------------------------
Lillian Jensen
Kent County Health Department
Grand Rapids MI
(616)634-4191
------------------------------

Lillian welcome! I'd love to hear more about your project- that it exactly what I think we need for our LHD. 

------------------------------
Alicia Nelson
St. Mary's County Health Department
Leonardtown MD
(301)885-8971
------------------------------

Original Message:
Sent: 02-01-2024 04:25 PM
From: Lillian Jensen
Subject: Introductions

Hi all!

My name is Lillian Jensen and I am affiliated with the Kent County Health Department in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I am currently working with Kent County as a private contractor to complete a data modernization project that we started during my MPH practicum (I graduate in April!). 

My project is about accelerating data into action in Kent County. I am building an automated data management pipeline which pulls surveillance data from the state's (rather old) surveillance systems, cleans and preprocesses it, then pipes the data into a Power BI dashboard. At the end of my contract we hope to have the dashboard up and running on the county webpage. 

Moving forward, I am interested in applying my data science background in local public health, so this feels like the right place for me!

As for my favorite dessert, my spouse makes a boozy chocolate mousse that is to die for :)

------------------------------
Lillian Jensen
Kent County Health Department
Grand Rapids MI
(616)634-4191
------------------------------

Hello, I'd like to participate in Informatics Champions again.  Please let me know when the next webinar is held.  Thank you!

------------------------------
Lisa Klotzbach MA, PHN, RN, LHIT
Dakota County Public Health Department
Rochester MN
651-554-6280
------------------------------