142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition

Annual Meeting Recordings are now available for purchase

303683
Evaluating the Effectiveness of Worker Mental Health Training: Experiences from the Gulf Responder Resilience Project

142nd APHA Annual Meeting and Exposition (November 15 - November 19, 2014): http://www.apha.org/events-and-meetings/annual
Wednesday, November 19, 2014 : 9:10 AM - 9:30 AM

Sue Ann Sarpy, MS, PhD , Sarpy and Associates, Charlottesville, VA
Felicia Rabito, MPH, PhD , Epidemiology Department/School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Tulane Unviersity, New Orleans, LA
In response to the mental health effects seen in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) designed and delivered mental health resilience training for workers in the Gulf.  The need for rigorous evaluations of disaster response trainings, such as those provided by the NIEHS Gulf Responder Resilience Project, is long established. Therefore, a systematic evaluation process to assess effectiveness of trainings was developed.   A combination of both quantitative and qualitative data were collected and analyzed to gain a comprehensive depiction of whether the training goals were attained as well as the relative effectiveness of the instructional activities and components for achieving these program goals and objectives.   This presentation will highlight the competency-based evaluation process as well as preliminary results of the effectiveness of the trainings presented to workers in the Gulf States.  Results will be discussed vis-à-vis making quality improvements to the training program, identifying lessons learned and best practices, and making better use of available resources and strategies.  The application of this evaluation system and resulting evidence will be discussed including implications for strengthening other worker health and safety programs in disaster response and guiding related policy development.

Learning Areas:

Occupational health and safety

Learning Objectives:
Describe a systematic comprehensive evaluation of a worker resilience training program effectiveness Discuss the preliminary results of the evaluation of the NIEHS Gulf Responder Resilience Project Describe the use of the results in ensuring continuous quality improvement of the worker resilience training and related policy development regarding disaster response.

Keyword(s): Evaluation, Occupational Health and Safety

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I have over 20 years of applied and academic experience in intervention effectiveness research. I have served as principal scientist for various research projects that evaluate the effectiveness of interventions including labor and minority worker safety training, and leadership and emergency preparedness training programs for public health workers. I have also served as lead evaluator for the South Central Center for Public Health Preparedness and South Central Public Health Training Center for Tulane University.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.