1. The Impact of Online Learning on Emergency Response: An Evaluation of an Online Course Thomas Chandler, PhD, Yoon Soo Park, MS, Karen L. Levin, RN, MPH, CHES, David M. Abramson, PhD MPH and Stephen S. Morse, PhD

2. Disclosures I have no relationships to disclose

3. http://www.ncdp.mailman.columbia.edu/bep

4. Online certification courses- blended learning method

5. Research Question Did this online course impact participants' response(s) during recent emergencies and disasters?

6. Online Survey Distributed to 4,000 previous course participants via email

8. Before taking this course, I was able to:

10. After taking this course, I was able to:

11. Findings Survey URL emailed to 4,000 previous course participants. Response rate: 13% (Many email bounce- backs) Significant increase for all pre / post competency ratings Reliability of the Online Measures: 0.9 (Nunnally (1978) has indicated 0.7 to be an acceptable reliability coefficient)

13. Top 5 disasters 1) H1N1 2) Water / food-borne pathogen 3) Hurricane 4) Flood 5) Fire

14. Geocoded Locations of Respondents

15. Competency/Disaster Matrix Note: (1) “+” indicates a significant positive improvement; “++” indicates a significant positive improvement over 1 point in the rating scale; “+++” indicates a significant positive improvement over 2 points. (2) “-” indicates an insignificant improvement; “--” indicates a decrease in score.

17. Which competencies from the online course served you well for your role(s) during the emergency response(s)? -> Communication competencies Qualitative Data

18. “The communication part and how we connected with all support systems. The different command centers and how they performed in an emergency.” Anthrax Hoax: “Our local health department fit into the Operations Section as we were assisting in getting samples to the Florida Department of Health Laboratory. We served in the Liaison Section communicating with the hospital. We also served in a Public Information role as we provided a PIO for the Unified Command. “

19. Which competencies did not serve you well for your role(s) during the emergency response(s)? -> Communication competencies Qualitative Data

20. “Methods of communication: people would do better texting several people vs calling” “How to use a smart phone” “Using social networking tools like Twitter and Facebook to send out the right message” “I am not high in the chain of command, so making any final decisions about notifying media of an event etc is not a part of something I would focus on.”

21. CDC & HRSA: Have encouraged the development of online, competency based courses. More research is needed to determine their effectiveness during disaster response. How can new online courses better address the core competencies? For eg, risk communication Too what extent does the type of disaster impact workers’ perceptions of their performance? Eg, terrorism, explosions vs H1N1 Implications:

22. www.ncdp.mailman.columbia.edu/bep tec11@columbia.edu