Last summer, "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes" became more than a science fiction spoof. In June 2008, tomatoes were blamed for a nationwide outbreak of Salmonella Saintpaul, a bacterial infection that caused serious illness in more than 1,400 people in 43 states, including North Carolina.

A public health nurse checks a woman's blood pressure during field work.

"We knew there was a need for a more formal training program," says Kathy Dail, RN, MEd, a nurse epidemiologist with the N.C. Division's communicable diseases branch. "There were no conferences or workshops. Each local health department was on its own" to report and investigate suspected outbreaks.

The N.C. Center for Public Health Preparedness had what Dail describes as a "vision of partnership." Center staff saw a good match between Dail's need to train local public health nurses and the Center's mission to train public health workers.

The result was "Introduction to Communicable Disease Surveillance and Investigation in N.C.," a 14-week, online course with a two-day, face-to-face skills demonstration. Topics include a history of epidemiology, threats to global public health, communicable disease laws and regulations, and steps to conduct an outbreak investigation and communicate findings to the public.

In 2006, the course became required for N.C. public health nurses who spend more than 75 percent of their time on communicable disease issues. To date, more than 300 public health nurses in more than 80 local health departments have completed the 60-hour training course.

Does the course make a difference? The nurses who have completed it think so - 99 percent say they would recommend it to a co-worker; 100 percent say they plan to implement on the job what they had learned.

Dail agrees. "This has been the most positive educational venture of my 25-plus years of teaching in public health settings," she says.

-- Bev Holt

Carolina Public Health is a publication of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Gillings School of Global Public Health. To view previous issues, please visit www.sph.unc.edu/cph.