COVID-19 Related APE Opportunities, RSPH

General Description:

The following positions are being offered as Applied Practice Experiences (APE) for current MPH students in the Rollins School of Public Health.  These positions will work in partnership with Emory faculty and key staff at the Georgia Department of Public Health (GDPH) to enhance GDPH’s surveillance and response process to the current COVID-19 pandemic in Georgia.  There are seven projects or APE opportunities available.  Interested students are asked to review the general job responsibilities and project-specific descriptions outlined below and indicate in a cover letter which top two projects/APE opportunities interest them. After a student has been selected for an APE opportunity they will meet with the designated Emory faculty who will serve as the student’s APE Field Supervisor.  The student and Field Supervisor will meet to identify how the APE will meet MPH foundational and concentration competencies, discuss the project’s goals/objectives, and outline the specific deliverables that will be produced at the end of the APE.

General Job Responsibilities (Students will assist with some but not likely all of the following):

1. Provide assistance with data collection, data cleaning and data quality assurance of data reported to the GDPH on COVID-related cases in Georgia
2. Provide assistance with descriptive analyses, network analyses and the development of risk profiles for various demographics related to COVID-related infection
3. Provide assistance in the development of public health reports/tools to assist GDPH with COVID-related risk mitigation and decision-making

Project Descriptions:

Project I: Geospatial

1. Assist in geocoding process and develop central repository of geocoded information
2. Establish spatial connections among cases (e.g., network analysis)
3. Assist in the development of descriptive and predictive analyses, including the development of items/products for dissemination
4. Assist in the ongoing development and maintenance of Facility Tool in SendSS

Project II: Persons Under Investigation

1. Ensure data quality by:
   1. Identifying where pertinent data are missing (e.g., county, city, exposures, symptoms, outcomes); providing a standard file with documentation of which data points to modify and how, and; creating standard code to perform data quality checks
   2. Identifying where data are logically inconsistent and providing standard file with documentation of which data points to modify and how
   3. Providing weekly standardized analytic file following data quality checks
2. Provide standardized means of characterizing the burden of COVID-19 in Georgia. Consider analyses conducted in other projects (Geospatial, Health Inequity, etc.)

Project III: Syndromic Surveillance

1. Analyze textual information from syndromic surveillance data to identify potential COVID emergency department visits
2. Analyze textual information on death certificates as a means of determining if they may be used as syndromic surveillance

Project IV: Health Inequities and Underlying Conditions

1. Characterize health inequities specific to COVID in Georgia (e.g., health care access, health care coverage)
2. Characterize burden of COVID among persons with known underlying conditions
3. Assist in the development of risk profiles for differing demographics (e.g., care takers)
4. Develop recommendations to mitigate impact of health inequity on COVID-19 transmission

Project V: Injury

1. Describe injury-related outcomes (e.g., homicide, suicide, accidental firearm, overdoses) using available data sources
2. Monitor motor vehicle crash burden
3. Assist in the analyses of burden of injury among the elderly who are living at home
4. Identify analyses to characterize the relationship between domestic violence and sheltering in place policies

Project VI: Social Media

1. Develop method for surveilling COVID-19 using social media feeds
2. Develop analyses and products to assist in using this analysis for the purpose of ongoing surveillance
3. Perform retrospective analysis of social media

Project VII: Transmission Dynamics

1. Ensure quality and completeness of data fields germane to disease transmission (e.g., exposures – household, institution, incarceration, travel), also subsequent data cleaning and curation.
2. Estimate reproductive numbers at county-level and facility-level.
3. Estimate serial interval based on contact tracing data and explore potential heterogeneity among different types of contacts (e.g. between different age groups and sex), potentially can be cross validated with third-party (e.g. facebook) social contact information.
4. Conduct social distancing and disease transmission analyses to better understand relationships between: a) policies, b) social distancing and other “behaviors” (e.g., transportation), and c) disease transmission.

How to Apply: 

Submit a cover letter and resume to Laura Donnelly at ldonnel [at] emory [dot] edu. 

*Please note that in the cover letter you should specifically indicate which top two of the seven projects you would like to apply to as an APE.

Timeline: 

These APE positions will begin in May 2020.