Great Lakes Center of Excellence in Environmental Health University of Illinois at Chicago School of Public Health

Presentation to Environmental Health Tracking Grantees [PDF - 2.12 MB]

Program Description The Great Lakes Center of Excellence in Environmental Health (GLC) builds the capacity of environmental health programs in public health departments in the Midwest by providing training and technical assistance and creating academic-health department partnerships.

Accomplishments
Geolibrary.org
Created GEOLibrary.org (www.geolibrary.org), a Web-based library of training materials in environmental and occupational health. GEOLibrary.org was developed with the support of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Institutes of Health, World Health Organization, and the Abbott fund. GEOLibrary.org is designed to house an array of educational materials and is searchable in six languages.

Technical Assistance
GLC provides technical assistance to health departments through joint health hazard evaluations on issues such as asbestos contamination of beaches and groundwater contamination with gasoline.

Practice Tools and Networking GLC provides Web-based access to practice tools and sharing of best practices: http://www.uic.edu/sph/glakes/coe/index.htm.

Barriers
Budget restrictions limit face-to-face contact and force increased reliance on telecommunications and Web-based resource sharing; individual health hazard evaluations are time and resource intensive.

What Is Next

Add CDC training resources and tools to GEOLibrary.org
Develop a separate “practice tools” search feature for GEOLibrary.org
Add a “Best Practices” feature to our Web site
Complete needs assessments for remaining states
Expand our Midwest electronic mailing list
Conduct new health hazard evaluation of tritium contamination of drinking water

National Transferability

GEOLibrary.org is a national and global resource; practice tools can be added to the site
Midwest “best practices” in environmental health can be shared nationally
Health hazard evaluation findings and needs assessment results will be published

Impact

Environmental health component of the Geolibrary
Health hazard evaluations for

An indoor air quality investigation at Sandburg High School (requested by the Illinois Department of Public Health)
Uncontained CTA track renovation work had the potential to contaminate soil adjacent to elevated tracks near children play areas (requested by the Chicago Department of Public Health Lead Poisoning Prevention Program)
Environmental investigation of Phialemonium curvatum infections at a dialysis clinic that caused a systemic infection from a rare fungal pathogen in four patients.
Air quality at a large government facility.
Determination of asbestos contamination in beach nourishment sand at the Illinois Beach State Park.
An outbreak of histoplasmosis in a crew of workers performing repair and renovation from bat guano.
Vapor intrusion of refinery hydrocarbons in residential properties in Hartford, Illinois, for more than 40 years.

Internet-based training in environmental health

Public health learning environmental health courses ( http://www.publichealthlearning.com/Public/Catalog/Default.aspx).
Webcasts on environmental health topics (http://www.uic.edu/sph/glakes/coe/training.htm).

Lead poisoning prevention awareness through local retailers: toolkit and workbook for on lead safe work practice materials for local health departments to conduct outreach to retail establishments for increasing awareness and use of lead-safe work practices.