Public Health Systems and Services

The goal of this Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) funded research project is an opportunity to collect and categorize real-time local public health policies and programs and assess their impact on the COVID-19 pandemic. We are administering a survey in June and July to local Medical Officers of Health/Medical Health Officers (and/or their designates) to document local public health unit (LPHU) operational functioning in terms of such elements as:

1. What LPHU interventions/measures to address COVID-19 have been implemented?
2. How the pandemic has affected routine local public health programs or services such as health promotion and disease/injury prevention?
3. How do other elements of LPHUs interact with the implementation of interventions including: surveillance and monitoring, leadership and governance, resources, partnerships and collaboration, and health equity paradigm?

The project is divided into four phases:

1. Rapidly gather data on LPHU operational functioning to address COVID-19 from Medical Officers of Health/Medical Health Officers.
2. Code and classify local public health operational functioning.
3. Apply a complex systems analytic lens to describe, assess and strengthen LPHU systems.
4. Estimate the impact of different LPHU interventions on critical COVID-19 outcomes. 

This project will also develop and demonstrate a methodology for capturing front-line public health policy and practice information at a high-resolution, in a routine manner. Our hope is that we can use our research on the local public health response to COVID-19 to mobilize more sustained investment in the surveillance and monitoring of local public health efforts in Canada generally.