ATSU offering new certificate in public health and emergency preparedness

Public health is something most people don't think about until they need it. But amid a global pandemic, health is at the forefront of everyone's thoughts.

To help train more health professionals in the wake of this situation, A.T. Still University is offering a new certificate program to teach individuals the necessary tools to manage public health emergencies. The Public Health Emergency Preparedness and Disaster Response program is done through ATSU's College of Graduate Health Studies, meaning it is done all online. It is open to anyone and graduates will finish with three FEMA certificates and a contact tracing certificate, too.

The program is split into four courses: public health, epidemiology, global health, and public health emergency preparedness and disaster response. There is a flow to the courses, where patrons get a good background on public health before piecing that together with emergency preparedness, though each course can also be taken individually and separately from the others. But linking emergency management to public health is a focal point of the program and something that hasn't been offered by other schools.

"In a pandemic, emergency response is a public health response," said Dr. Don Altman, dean of the College of Graduate Health Studies.

And how does the course help bring those areas together?

"Education," Altman answered. "In this pandemic, I think there's been a lot of politics rather than public health, and this is our time to bring that back to a public health focus. It's the only way we can actually control or manage a pandemic or any sort of emergency."

A group of experienced professionals will lead instruction. Altman isn't teaching the course, but has several experiences in emergency response. He has been a member of the National Disaster Medical System, which deploys medical professionals to areas of need, for more than 20 years. His first deployment came after 9/11, where he helped identify human remains with dental records.

He was also involved in COVID-19 work earlier this year. The Grand Princess cruise line had a mass outbreak of the virus in March and hundreds of passengers were quarantined at U.S. military bases. Altman was deployed to the Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in San Diego to help oversee those people.

Dr. Mary-Katherine McNatt is the public health department chair for ATSU and will be one of the co-instructors for the first rendition of the course. McNatt previously worked in bioterrorism response and was the first pandemic planner for Dallas County, Texas. Since the program covers a wide spectrum, there are also professors with experience in hurricane response, train derailments, and another disease specialist who worked on the national pandemic plan in 2006. Everything from outbreak scenarios to contact tracing and terrorist attacks and mass violence incidents will be covered.

McNatt said the course was also designed with community health centers in mind. In rural areas, those healthcare workers are the first responders. But they don't always have emergency training.

"Right now, the public health field is undermanned, understaffed and it's a need that will continue to grow," McNatt said. "We need contact tracers, we need public health managers, we need trained professionals in the field."

McNatt said starting this course is a bit of a double-edged sword. On one side, she's happy to train more people and create stronger healthcare professionals. But that comes as a global pandemic has sickened more than 27 million people and killed more than 900,000.

"In 2006, we were talking about this and telling people, 'Watch out, it's going to happen.' You help write plans and you tell everyone to be careful. We learned so much about the 1918 pandemic and I could tell you about it in my sleep. But it's one of those things you never want to see in your lifetime," McNatt said. "When this started in January, I hunkered down, kept my kids at home and my husband thought I was crazy. ... When you know too much about something, it becomes frightening. When you see people not taking enough care, not taking enough caution, not wearing masks and acting like everything is normal, it's very frightening because you know what could happen."

And learning from this current crisis will help prepare for future ones similar in nature.

"I don't think this is the last pandemic that we'll see," Altman said. "We were taken by surprise, I guess, with this one, but we should never be taken by surprise again. So there should be a lot of lessons learned from these last six or seven months."

Registration is open now for anyone interested in the class. The deadline closes on Dec. 9 and the first cohort will begin in January. For more information, visit www.atsu.edu/certificate-in-public-health-emergency-prep-and-disaster-response.

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