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Our thoughts are with Texas and all those across the country impacted by the Winter storm.
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BUEHLER CENTER PROJECTS
Without question, SARS-CoV-2, the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 has resulted in an unprecedented pandemic in modern history with significant morbidity and mortality that has a deleterious impact on the global economy, violence, mental health, and food security. Public health surveillance informs the policy needed to eliminate COVID-19 which depends on a variety of metrics to identify high-priority events. GASSP WEBSITE
To help find ways to prevent opioid overdose deaths it is important that we know the facts. The Statewide Unintentional Drug Overdose Reporting System (SUDORS) helps us understand emerging trends and factors leading up to the overdose and can be used to develop prevention approaches. SUDORS WEBSITE
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With submission support from the Buehler Center team, Northern Illinois Recovery Community Organization (NIRCO) was awarded $225,000 in funding for one year from the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority's (ICIJA). The project focuses on NIRCO's Recovery Support Services Program for Returning Citizens. This program provides individualized holistic support to returning citizens in Lake County. Maryann Mason, Ph.D. and Sarah Welch, MPH, will serve as the external evaluators for this project.
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JMIR Publications | Original paper:
Dynamic Panel Data Modeling and Surveillance of COVID-19 in Metropolitan Areas in the United States: Longitudinal Trend Analysis
"The COVID-19 pandemic has had profound and differential impacts on metropolitan areas across the United States and around the world. Within the United States, metropolitan areas that were hit earliest with the pandemic and reacted with scientifically based health policy were able to contain the virus by late spring. For other areas that kept businesses open, the first wave in the United States hit in mid-summer. As the weather turns colder, universities resume classes, and people tire of lockdowns, a second wave is ascending in both metropolitan and rural areas. It becomes more obvious that additional SARS-CoV-2 surveillance is needed at the local level to track recent shifts in the pandemic, rates of increase, and persistence." -- JMIR Publication
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Qualitative Methods Workshop for Community Partners - Two-Part Workshop
This *two-part session will provide an introductory overview of qualitative methods including types of qualitative data, tool creation, data collection methods, analysis, and provide opportunities to apply this learning through practice. The sessions will focus on qualitative methods most relevant to health-related community programming so there will be a heavy focus on preparing and conducting interviews. The second session will focus on learning from practice exercise experiences and analyzing interview and focus-group data.
Two-Part Workshop:
Part 1: Qualitative methods review
March 16th from 2-3PM
Part 2: Practical application and analysis
March 22nd from 2-3PM
Registration Required - Email us to register for this two-part workshop at ARCC@northwestern.edu.
Previous trainings available online:
Intro to Evaluation
Using Focus Groups in Research and Evaluation
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 Last week we shared that Dr. Maryann Mason has been named, Associate Director of the Buehler Center for Health Policy & Economics.
Here's a little background on Dr. Mason,
Tell us about your research, a bit about your professional history, where you came from and how you ended up at NU? One of my lighting strike moments in my career was a realization there is "health" in all policies.
I was looking at Illinois State Board of Education guidelines and thought to myself that educational policies do so much to set the stage for healthy behaviors --whether it be PE standards, instructional time requirements, school food nutritional requirements, school building siting requirements and on and on. That's when I realized that my career was going to focus on population health and health policy. Today my work is much more focused on violence and drug overdose prevention but the same principle about health in all policies rings true and has led me to work intensely to create and sustain data systems to inform health policy. I currently serve as principal investigator for the Illinois Violent Death Reporting System which is part of the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) and the Illinois Statewide Unintentional Drug Overdose Reporting System (SUDORS) part of a national system operated by the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control. With these systems, our goal is to put together the "who, what, where, how and why" for violent death and drug overdose to develop data informed strategies for prevention. I often say that I am an "accidental" academic in that I started out in community development and came to academics to gain the skills to do research to inform action --including informing policy. I never left because I saw a unique role for myself in bringing these worlds together and that has been my long-term academic objective. I am thrilled to be part of the Buehler Center where opportunities for this abound through its focus on health policy.
Tell us a fun fact about yourself that NU faculty won’t know about you?
After some struggle to identify something it came to me when visiting family in Wisconsin over winter holidays --I speak fluent "Wisconsinese" and can switch between Chicago and Wisconsin accents seamlessly. So hey there!
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