The public health discovery game provides the interaction of processes and collaboration between various public health professionals that help to identify the cause of a disease. The game illustrates the different epidemiological processes that are used to identify the occurrence of diseases. Spatial analysis undertaken through location mapping is used to identify the cause of the disease at Watersedge and aids in the formulation of necessary interventions to prevent more infections. This paper documents the process used to determine the cause of the disease in the city.
Following a thorough epidemiological process that involved the collaboration between different public health practitioners, the infection causing organism was identified as cryptosporidium. The cryptosporidium parasite leads to a disease referred to as cryptosporidiosis (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 2017). The symptoms of the disease include diarrhea, nausea, vomiting, fever etc. (CDC, 2017). The search for the organism causing the infection was undertaken through different epidemiological processes such as spatial analysis and laboratory investigations. Spatial analysis was the primary epidemiological process involved to identify the cause of the disease. It includes disease mapping to help give clues to the probable cause of infection (Choi, 2013). The method is quite effective in pointing out the cause of a disease.
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The search for the cause of the disease involved the efforts of the different public health practitioners at the Watersedge Department of Public Health. These practitioners included the health planner, epidemiologist, microbiologist, health educator, environmental health specialist, public health nurse and the public health information officer. The search for the disease cause was kickstarted by the public health nurse, Terry, who interviewed the patients as to the places they had visited before they fell sick. The interviews provided a guiding point as to the place that the investigation should begin. The locations that the infected patients had visited before falling ill were mapped on the city map. The plotting revealed that most of the sick patients had visited Thompson Park. Consequently, the investigation was narrowed down to Thompson Park.
Following the identification of Thompson Park as a possible location where the patients contracted the infection, a field study was conducted. The field study at Thompson Park was meant to search for potential indicators as to the cause of the infection (CDC, 2016). The identified indicators included the fountains at the Park, a flyer advertising a cleanup exercise, the geese, drain, lake, and a farm near the lake. The fountains were likely to have been supplied with tainted water. The flyer indicated the day that the cleanup exercise was undertaken, which coincided with the day that most people fell ill. The droppings from geese are at times contaminated with E. coli. The drain discharges the runoff water into the lake. The farm was of concern due to the runoff water that drains into the ocean.
Subsequently, the decision to collect samples for laboratory analysis was made by the staff epidemiologist. Additional patient interviews were conducted to help inform the decision on the place that the sampling should start. The interviews were more specific. They targeted to collect information on whether the patients had swum in the lake, drank water or beverages and from which fountains or restaurants. The results of the interviews were mapped, and they indicated that most patients had drunk some fruit punch from the Concessions stand or water from the fountain near the lake beach.
Consequently, water samples were collected from the fountains at the Park. During the sample collection, one of the staff at the Concessions stand was interviewed. The employee revealed that during the cleanup exercise they sold lots of fruit punch and since the water to the Concession stand was turned off, the fruit punch was prepared using water fetched from the fountain near the beach. An encounter with the health educator revealed that there had been heavy rains which had resulted in lots of runoff from the farms.
Upon reporting back to the Department of Health offices to take the water samples for analysis, the health planner, Leslie offered a newspaper which indicated that experts were worried about the runoffs occasioned by the heavy rains. The laboratory analysis done by the microbiologist revealed that the sample from the fountain near the beach was contaminated with cryptosporidium while the other sample tested negative. Cryptosporidium infects both animals and humans; hence it causes a zoonotic infection (CDC, 2015). The environmental health specialist, Mai, revealed that the filter to the fountain located near the beach had become faulty and that it had tested positive for cryptosporidium.
The collection of further details concerning the water supply to the Park helped unravel the puzzle concerning the disease outbreak. The fountain near the beach received its supplies form a well and its piping system had not been replaced during an upgrade. The other fountains received their supplies from the city water connection. Thus, the isolation of the parasite to only one spot. The epidemiologist together with the public health information officer helped to put together the different pieces of the infection puzzle. It was evident that the heavy rains experienced days before the outbreak had led to the formation of runoff water from the cattle farm. The runoff water transmitted the cryptosporidium parasite from the farm into the groundwater where it infected the well that is the source of water for the fountain near the beach. Since the filter at this fountain had become faulty, any individual who consumed water drawn from this fountain became infected with cryptosporidiosis. The mode of infection was either through direct consumption of the water or fruit punch prepared using water drawn from this fountain. Consequently, the Department of health made the necessary interventions to prevent more people from contracting the infection (CDC, 2016). The old and defective fountain filter needed to be replaced with one that is effective.
Epidemiological processes help in investigation of a disease outbreak. In this case study, the public health team used disease mapping approach to identify the source of the infection in the city. The method proved to be useful since it pinpointed to the origin of the cryptosporidiosis infection in the city. More importantly, the approach helps in the formulation of appropriate interventions to prevent further spread of disease. The health team decided that the filter to the fountain supplied with infected water needed to be changed so that no more individuals would contract the disease.
References
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2015). Sources of Infection & Risk Factors | Cryptosporidium | Parasites | CDC . Cdc.gov. Retrieved 5 June 2020, from https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/crypto/infection-sources.html .
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2016). Principles of Epidemiology: Lesson 6, Section 2|Self-Study Course SS1978|CDC . Cdc.gov. Retrieved 5 June 2020, from https://www.cdc.gov/csels/dsepd/ss1978/lesson6/section2.html .
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. (2017). Illness & Symptoms | Cryptosporidium | Parasites | CDC . Cdc.gov. Retrieved 5 June 2020, from https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/crypto/illness.html .
Choi, M. (2013). Book Review: Spatial Analysis in Epidemiology. Healthcare Informatics Research , 19 (2), 148. https://doi.org/10.4258/hir.2013.19.2.148
