Georgia PH week [Mar. 5, 2012]

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Public Health Reception Celebrates New Dept. & Comr., Highlights Dept.'s Priorities for Children

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In This Issue
Priorities for Children Healthy Balanced Breakfast
DPH Trains Future Doc Crick Heads Floyd Health Social Marketing Campaign Social Media Harnessed

On Feb. 22, Governor Deal addressed a crowd of nearly 100 people child and health advocates, legislators, and agency heads - at Voices for Georgia's Children's reception to celebrate the new, executive-level Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH) and welcome Dr. Brenda Fitzgerald as its commissioner. (In July 2011, DPH became a stand-alone, cabinetlevel agency after more than 30 years of being consolidated under other departments.)

PHEVENTS
The Locker Room: A Male Health Initiative
Ribbon Cutting Ceremony Mar. 8 1 p.m.
Clayton Co. Board of Health Be one of the first to see the new malefriendly, locker room themed reception area that will serve as the point of entry
for men's healthcare services at the Clayton Co. Board of Health.
Be Healthy Georgia Kids One Mile Fun Run
Mar. 10 9 a.m. Georgia State Capitol
Cost: FREE! Register by Mar. 8 here
Join Lt. Governor Casey Cagle as Healthy Kids Georgia hosts the 2nd Annual Be Healthy Georgia Day at the Capitol.
Superpuff Saturday: Asthma Day Camp
Mar. 10 9 a.m. - 3 p.m. First Baptist Church, Tifton For children 6-12 years old and their parents Sponsored by Children's Medical Services, South Health District & Tift Regional Medical Center Camp offers a fun-filled day of games, food and prizes while increasing your knowledge about asthma, its treatment, how to cope with the illness and special needs associated with
asthma. For more information contact CMS at 800-

Governor Deal, with First Lady Sandra Deal and Comr. Fitzgerald standing by, spoke to the group at the Freight Depot about the important role DPH plays in the lives of Georgia's children, especially in reducing childhood obesity - a significant problem in Georgia, as our children are the heaviest in the country next to Mississippi.
Comr. Fitzgerald - a founding board member of Voices and new member of Governor Deal's "Leadership Team for Children" - also addressed the crowd and discussed DPH's priorities for 2012, which include, but are not limited to, infant mortality, childhood immunizations and childhood obesity. (Learn more about Comr. Fitzgerald's plans for DPH here and read our 2012 Health Steps Indicators publication for more information on these issues in Georgia.)
Healthy Balanced Breakfast at School
Helps Students Shine
Breakfast has long been considered the most important meal of the day and it is incredibly important for students, as it provides the energy necessary to get ready for a day of learning.
Studies have shown that students who eat breakfast have a general increase in math and reading scores, increased

848-5728 or 229-245-4310.
Board of Public Health Meeting
Mar. 13 1 p.m. 5th Floor Board Room 2 Peachtree Street
Superpuff Saturday: Asthma Day Camp
Apr. 21 9 a.m. - 3 p.m. Northside Baptist Church, Valdosta For children 6-12 years old and their parents Sponsored by Children's Medical Services & South Health District Camp offers a fun-filled day of games, food and prizes while increasing your knowledge about asthma, its treatment, how to cope with the illness and special
needs associated with asthma. For more information contact CMS at 800848-5728 or 229-245-4310.

attention and improved behavior. A study in Pediatrics suggests that hungry students are more likely to have to repeat a grade, and according to the Minnesota Department of Children and Learning, students who eat breakfast before starting school have fewer discipline problems and visit school nurses' offices less often.
Many schools in Georgia are adopting programs that encourage students to eat healthy breakfasts. In fact, 85 percent of Georgia's schools have a breakfast program. Marietta City Schools adopted a Grab n' Go Breakfast program geared towards placing healthy and nutritious breakfast foods in mobile units for students to "grab" on the way to class.
The program is free for all the students in the district. As students enter their schools, they can grab an easy, balanced breakfast and head to class. By the time the bell rings, they are fueled up and ready to learn. The successful program was featured recently during a CBS "Fit Kids Fit Families" segment.
Public Health Training Proves Significant for Medical Doctor

Submit Calendar Entries to askdph@dhr.state.ga.us

Luke Shouse, M.D., M. P.H., experienced the inside world of Public Health as a medical resident,

full-time employee, and now as the CDC assignee to the HIV/ AIDS surveillance section. A graduate of East Tennessee State University's Quillen College of Medicine in 1999, Dr. Shouse is

PHRECIPE
15-Minute Black Bean Salad
Servings: 4
Click Here for Full Recipe

board certified in Preventive Medicine/ Public Health.

Fresh out of his residency, Luke Shouse, M.D., M.P.H., is pictured here as a new employee in the HIV section
in 2003.

"I completed my Preventive Medicine residency at Morehouse School of Medicine in June 2002," said Dr. Shouse. "During my residency, I participated in a three month rotation at the Georgia Department of Public Health (formerly Division of Public Health) in the Epidemiology Branch." Dr. Shouse has landed once again in the Epidemiology Branch as he fills a recent vacancy.

Crick Heads Floyd County Health Department

PHBRIEFS
DPH Social Media Recognized
The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Service named the Georgia Department of Public
Health's Facebook page as one of the 10 Best Health Agency Facebook pages in the country. Pages were selected based on the number of regular updates and variety of health and other relevant
information. "LIKE" DPH's Facebook page
InSTEP Action Begins!
Participants enrolled in the 2 Peachtree worksite wellness program, InSTEP, officially begin the program today. Participants will log into the InSTEP website to record their activity and
healthy choices every day. Participants can also view video of the recommended activities to do during brain breaks. Get
moving!

Nichole Crick has been named Nurse Manager for the Floyd County Health Department. She has been serving in that capacity since the first of the year. She also continues as Program Manager for the Ryan White Specialty Clinic. Crick has ten years public health experience at both county and district levels.

She has experience

Nichole Crick, Nurse Manager, Floyd County Health Department

with most state and

local public health programs, including extensive experience with

PHTRAINING
Community Needs Assessment for the Public Health Practitioner
Mar. 15- Mar. 16 Macon Training Center Macon, GA This two-day course focuses on the basics of community needs assessment.
RSVP: March 12, 2012 For complete training details and to register click here. Click on Upcoming
Events. Email Tara Redd with questions
Performance Management Process
Mar. 22 9 a.m. - 4 p.m. 2 Peachtree St., 7th floor, room 2 1-day course for new supervisors and managers to learn the four phases of the Performance Management Process (PMP)
To register in SABA, click here
Health Communications Skills for the Public Health Practitioner
Mar. 29-30 Dolce Atlanta-Peachtree
Peachtree City, GA This hands-on two-day training course will provide practical tools and strategies on how health communication can be
used in public health practice. RSVP: Mar. 23
For complete training details and to register click here. Click on Upcoming
Events. Email Tara Redd with questions
Larval Mosquito ID class
Apr. 16-17

the Children with Special Needs program, which she previously managed. Crick also worked for four years in the private sector as director of a private hospice program.
HIV Social Marketing Campaign to
Target Women, Girls
National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day is a nationwide observance that encourages people to take action in the fight against HIV/AIDS and raise awareness of its impact on women and girls. It is observed on March 10, but throughout the month organizations and health agencies in Georgia come together to support, encourage discussion, and teach women and girls about prevention of HIV, the importance of getting tested for HIV, and how to live with and manage HIV/AIDS.
This year, the Georgia Department of Public Health (DPH) Office of HIV is excited to support this national observance by partnering with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and other local agencies and health departments to launch a new multi-faceted social marketing campaign - "Take Charge. Take the Test." (TCTT). This new initiative is designed to increase HIV testing among minority women by empowering them with

Chatham County Mosquito Control facility, Savannah
Free mosquito ID classes open to environmental health specialists, mosquito control techs, PCOs, and anyone else with an interest in learning
to ID mosquitoes To sign up, email Rosmarie Kelly
Submit Calendar Entries to askdph@dhr.state.ga.us
PHNEWS
Decline in teen pregnancies
Good News Clinics there for uninsured citizens
Blowing more smoke
Are you prepared for tornado season?
Flu season starts late but may be picking up, CDC says
New Methods Could Speed Up Repair Of Injured Nerves
When should mom give up the car keys?
Autism not diagnosed as early in minority children
Mobiles and medicine: The brave new world of mHealth

information, encouraging them to get tested, and enabling them to take charge of their lives - whatever their HIV test result.
Epidemiologists Consider How Social
Media Could be Harnessed to Predict
Disease Outbreaks
Epidemiologists converged on Feb.16 at the 2012 International Conference on Digital Disease Detection at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts. On the agenda is informal media-like Twitter, blog posts, and web searches-and how these could be applied to identify, track, and predict disease outbreaks. The meeting is sponsored by the CDC and Health Map, and run by a team of researchers at Children's Hospital Boston, which mines online data to identify and track disease outbreaks.
Although informal media is already being utilized by researchers, such as Twitter to track cholera outbreaks in Haiti, not everyone is ready to incorporate it into their surveillance. Informal data's reliability is yet untested, Andrea Dugas of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore told Nature. Informal data have also not been shown to help predict outbreaks, added Richard Rothman, an emergencymedicine physician at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine who coauthored with Dugas a paper correlating influenza-related web searches with a spike in emergency room visits for the illness. Other researchers are concerned with sifting through the sea of possible data to find the pertinent information.

PHWEEK
Editor Kimberly Stringer
Content Coordinator Connie F. Smith
Graphic Designer Jimmy Clanton, Jr.
Digital Properties Manager Bobbi Powell
Editorial & Design Team Charles Gary Ginny Jacobs
Sandra Roberts Suleima Salgado
Director of Communications Ryan Deal

Public Health Observances for March 2012

National Women & Girls HIV/ AIDS Awareness Day March 10
Click Here for more information

National Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month
Click Here for more information

National School Breakfast Week March 5 - 9
Click Here for more information

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