Since 1987 Epicentre has been designing and organising training courses for Médecins Sans Frontières and for other partners such as NGOs and international agencies. The main topics of these courses include:

• Rapid health assessment in emergency situations
• Program monitoring (nutrition, immunization) in emergency situations
• Epidemiological survey methods
• Epidemic outbreak investigations
• Epidemiological surveillance systems
• Training of trainers
• Software tools used in epidemiology: EPI INFO, FUCHIA

Epicentre's epidemiologists are also involved in teaching post-graduate university courses on epidemiology or public health, in institutions throughout Europe.

The objectives and content of training courses are determined in full collaboration with requesting organisations, and adapted to their specific needs. The teaching methodology used by Epicentre is both participative and practical, alternating between case studies and exercises based o­n actual situations encountered in the field and interactive theoretical presentations.

The design, preparation, and implementation of the courses all involve Epicentre's team of experienced trainers, whose expertise comprises training methods, field epidemiology, software and statistics.

In 1994, Epicentre was accredited as a training site for public health interns of the Assistance Publique des Hôpitaux de Paris. Epicentre also welcomes post-graduate students in epidemiology.

Training department staff

For additional information, please contact:
Isabelle Beauquesne, training expert
Danielle Michel, assistant