The Geographic Health Equity Alliance (GHEA) and Counter Tools partnered to create the Geographic Surveillance Learning Collaborative for National Tobacco Control Programs and National Comprehensive Cancer Control. The primary objective of this collaborative was to build the capacity of state programs to conduct surveillance of tobacco policies in a format that adheres to the methods and principles of the field of policy surveillance. Seven states participated in the Year 1 Collaborative and shared how they used geographic surveillance to support program planning, identify health disparities and improve communication strategies and policy efforts.<\/p>\n<\/div>
The Geographic Health Equity Alliance (GHEA) and\u00a0Counter Tools\u00a0facilitated the\u00a0inaugural Geographic Surveillance Learning Collaborative<\/a>\u00a0for\u00a0National Tobacco Control Programs<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0National Comprehensive Cancer Control<\/a>\u00a0from May to September 2020. In order to participate, interested states were required to establish a three-person team consisting of a statewide representative from each of the following fields: (1) tobacco control, (2) comprehensive cancer control and (3) epidemiology or related field that handles the development of statewide geospatial tools.<\/p>\n Six states participated in the Year 1 Collaborative: Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, <\/strong>and\u00a0Wisconsin.<\/strong>\u00a0Each team was responsible for collaborating across departments (tobacco control, comprehensive cancer and epidemiology) to create a presentation highlighting examples of their use of geographic surveillance systems. Teams shared how they used geographic surveillance to support program planning, identify health disparities and improve communication strategies and policy efforts. Along with presentations from participating states, each monthly collaborative session featured dedicated time for questions and peer-to-peer networking. The Year 1 Collaborative also included two presentations from national experts representing the\u00a0Policy Surveillance Program<\/a>\u00a0at the Center for Public Health Law Research and the Center for Disease Control\u2019s\u00a0U.S. Cancer Statistics<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>