A Continuity of Operations Plan (COOP) facilitates the performance of a health department's functions during a public health emergency or other situation which may interrupt normal services.

This tip sheet guides local health departments through the second phase of COOP planning, the process of identifying critical functions and services.

Learn about public health preparedness issues such as isolation and quarantine, workforce activation/surge, vulnerable populations planning, risk communications, and pandemic influenza preparedness with tools directed towards Local Health Departments (LHDs), businesses, and community agencies.

Tabletop exercises are one of the strategies that the public health workforce can use to convene and engage their community partners. This resource provides state and local public health entities with information and guidance on the key ingredients to consider when developing and facilitating a bioterrorism tabletop exercise.

This module provides an engaging educational experience that simulates field-based decisions related to environmental health issues for two scenarios: a major flood and a chemical spill caused by a train derailment.

Design and conduct a full-scale disaster exercise using a DVD-based interactive training course designed to assist public health and emergency management professionals.

The DVD includes video footage that details Tarrant County's full-scale dirty bomb disaster drill. The tool also includes an interactive training manual as well as a chapter-based lecture series focused on the design and evaluation components of a public health exercise.

This web-based training course focuses on the role of environmental health professionals in emergency preparedness.

Divided into two modules, “Emergency Preparedness and Response Fundamentals” and “Putting Principles into Practice,” this course addresses basic environmental health concepts important to front-line staff with years of experience as well as those new to the field.

This toolkit bundles together three of the APC’s environmental health resources: the Emergency Preparedness and Response Fundamentals training module, the Disaster Strikes – Environmental Health Responds: Stories from the Field training module, and the Emergency Handbook for Food Managers.

Inclusive Just-in-Time Training (I-JITT) for Public Health Investigations is a comprehensive and systematic toolkit designed to support individuals leading and responding to a public health emergency. Its approach to training is aligned with best practice from the field of adult learning theory.

The toolkit consists of five components: Implementation Instructions for the Preparedness Planner, an Operational Briefing Checklist for the Epidemiology/Surveillance Group Supervisor, a Field Training Guide for Team Leaders (complete with Job Action Sheets), a “Go-Guide” job aide for surge responders to utilize during an incident, and a short evaluation form to evaluate the I-JITT approach.

Intended for use by local health departments (LHDs) as part of a multi-sector effort to coordinate planning for and response to a pandemic influenza outbreak, the 60-page guide offers the following: An overview of key issues that should be considered for inclusion in a local jurisdiction's pandemic influenza plan. An examination within each issue area of questions that should be asked, ideas on where to find information that may be needed, and partners that could be consulted to address those topics within the plan. Examples of ways in which other jurisdictions have addressed the topics described in the guide. Links to information that can be used to further investigate the topics or resources that can be used to customize tools for individual jurisdictions. At the core of this guide are plans developed by departments that host two of NACCHO's Advanced Practice Centera, cutting-edge learning laboratories that develop and test tools that help other LHDs tackle all-hazards preparedness. Santa Clara County, California and Seattle-King County, Washington, have both produced notably comprehensive, but very different, plans addressing pandemic influenza that serve as the foundation of this document's findings.

The Managing Surge Response and Public Health Workforce Activation Toolkit provides knowledge, information and tools developed by the Seattle & King County Advanced Practice Center in preparing its own surge response and Public Health Workforce Activation response plans.

The toolkit is designed as a guide, not a substitute, for the collaborative planning process that each health jurisdiction must undertake. The planning process, embedded in your local context, is necessary to develop a plan. Your team may add or eliminate sections of the process that will best fit the planning needs of your jurisdiction. The purpose of the toolkit is to help your jurisdiction save time during your planning process by suggesting a planning framework.

This public health clinic operations toolkit, developed by the Montgomery County Advanced Practice Center, incorporates four training modules and comes with the following items: an instructors guide; appendices of resources and templates; a CD-ROM containing PDF versions of all materials; and a DVD with two training videos. Operation Caroline demonstrates a mock dispensing and vaccination clinic and Operation Dagwood demonstrates a mock smallpox vaccination clinic.

This exercise guide is a rich resource tool utilizing tools previously developed by the Tarrant County APC to provide guidance on performing a public health-focused radiological exercise. The document distills key information from a variety of authoritative sources, to be used as a process guide for local health departments to perform one of the most critical but often neglected aspects of public health readiness: the operations-based or test exercise for an incident involving radioactive agents such as a radioactive dispersion device or so-called “dirty bomb.” The guide contains numerous links to planning and training resources from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the US Department of Homeland Security, and Department of Energy websites. The CD also contains a 17 minute video overview of a major field functional exercise performed in November 2004 involving a simulated dirty bomb at a major NASCAR facility, the Texas Motor Speedway. This CD should be used as a didactic piece along with the DVD, “Designing, Implementing, and Evaluating a Public Health Exercise – A Dirty Bomb Disaster.” The CD covers additional operational considerations in performing a radiological exercise.

This tool guides an experienced Local Health Department (LHD) administrator or Incident Commander (IC) through decision-making processes to allocate staff between two major types of public health operations both in advance of, and during, a public health emergency. Disease investigation (surveillance, investigation, contact tracing, and case management) due to a naturally occurring disease, food-borne outbreak, or bioterrorist event Mass prophylaxis (using medicines or vaccines to mitigate disease) While the tool applies to any incident calling for both disease investigation and prophylaxis operations, it is aimed at larger scale emergency operations requiring rapid decision-making to obtain and allocate surge staff resources—decisions that may have to be justified to and approved by authorities within, or outside of, the LHD. This tool is comprised of three distinct worksheets: Decision points in a flow diagram representing various points in disease investigation and mass prophylaxis operations Response questions for decision-makers to consider when collecting information to make decisions Staffing needs based on plans, the scenario, and specific decisions Although intended for disease investigation and mass prophylaxis operations, this tool operates within a greater public health context that may involve other interventions (e.g., isolation & quarantine, social distancing, and risk communication). This tool organizes complex information into simpler categories that will help determine resource needs based on the local situation, operational objectives, plans, and partnerships. For example: Tested plans that will achieve operational objectives. Risk communication plans to make the public an informed partner able to adhere to public health recommendations or requirements. Partner organizations that provide staffing resources to LHD operations, or that independently conduct operations. The tool includes a example emergency scenario to illustrate the proper use of the tool and a related public health decision-making pathway.