Center for Infectious Diseases & Emergency Readiness

When it matters most, to make decisions, set priorities, or allocate resources we must rank and select among available options ("alternatives"). To accomplish this we develop and weight criteria, and then evaluate the alternatives against these criteria. More important criteria should have higher weights. For important decisions we should use science-based, objective measurements and methods to derive criteria weights. In this tutorial we cover how to use the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) to derive criteria weights. More specifically, we illustrate how to conduct pair-wise comparisons of criteria with respect to importance, likelihood, or preference. For numerical calculations, we use R---an open source programming language for statistical computing and graphics.

Following a multi-agency, multi-level statewide functional exercise in California, we distributed a web-based survey to exercise participants to identify factors that promoted organizational participation in the exercise. To our knowledge, this is the first systematic attempt to understand which factors influence organizational participation in statewide exercises. Awareness of these factors will be useful for promoting participation in future exercises and enable state officials to prioritize resources for the design and conduct of statewide exercises.This paper focuses on factors that encouraged participation, particularly that of local health departments.

The Association of Bay Area Health Officials (ABAHO) is a regional network of 13 local health jurisdictions in the San Francisco Bay Area. Since the early 1980’s the ABAHO network has brought together representatives from Bay Area health departments to address issues ranging from the emergence of the HIV/AIDS epidemic to pandemic influenza preparedness. Utilizing both a health officials committee and a public health preparedness subcommittee, the ABAHO network leverages the expertise and resources of local health departments to advance regional public health and promote communication and collaboration among neighboring counties.