Defining core competencies for epidemiologists working in communicable disease surveillance and response in the public health administrations of the European Union

Strengthening the capacity to combat infectious diseases in the European Union (EU) is a core function of the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), clearly expressed in its mandate.

To fill the gaps in professional performance, it is necessary to define the tasks and skills required of field epidemiologists.The development of such a list of core competencies was highlighted as a priority among the conclusions of the first ECDC consultation with EU Member States on training in field epidemiology, in December 2005 [2].
The ECDC, along with a group of experts, has developed a list of suggested core competencies for field epidemiologists working in public health institutions in the European Union, at all levels, from sub-national (provinces, districts, regions) to national and supra-national (European and international).An agreed definition of the term "field epidemiologist" is not available, but the group of experts has proposed one for the purpose of this activity (Table 1) [3].

Core competencies
A competency is a combination of knowledge, skills and abilities that a professional must demonstrate and that are critical to perform work effectively.
Core competencies are defined first for middle-level professionals, as opposed to junior or senior epidemiologists.Despite the risk of creating artificial categories in the career development ladder, this approach has been taken to facilitate the process.At a later phase, the competencies can be developed for other career stages.
The term "core" indicates that the competencies should be a minimum pre-requisite for any field epidemiologist, regardless of the level he/she occupies in the public health administration.They should be common to all professionals in this field.

Use
of the list of core competencies We believe that the list may have several users: -Employers, such as public health institutes and administrative bodies at all levels in the EU, who may use the list to assess their epidemiological capacities and needs.
-Epidemiologists themselves who may use the list for planning and evaluating their own career development (Table 2).
In addition, teachers and facilitators can use the list to design strategies and programmes to train future generations of epidemiologists in order to meet the needs of public health agencies.
Among the competencies, one can distinguish "workforce" competencies, as opposed to "instructional" ones, depending on the perspective taken for their development: i.e. employers or trainers views, respectively.
According to the MACH model (the acronym is made up of the initials of the authors' surnames [4]), both approaches are complementary and can be part of a more complex cycle, where the primary outcome is organizational performance.In this model, the contribution of employees is defined by the workforce competencies or tasks; from these, the instructional competencies are developed in order to conduct needs assessments and planning of relevant training.The training and the personal skills influence the individual performance, which in turn affect the organizational performance thus closing the cycle [4].
Furthermore, we hope that publishing and promoting this list of core competencies in the EU's public health system can help to: • agree on a definition of "field epidemiologist" and achieve the recognition of the profession; • allow Member States to assess their resources and define their needs; • set priorities by teachers and curriculum developers; and • increase the comparability of field epidemiology training programmes, which could facilitate mobility in the EU through accreditation initiatives.

Further development
We want to encourage a discussion of this list of core competencies by experts in the field.We also plan to review and update the list at regular intervals, as public health practice and knowledge evolves.

In
July 2007, an online survey was launched on the ECDC website (http://www.ecdc.europa.eu).It seeks to score a list of 85 competencies that belong to 26 domains in eight areas (Table 3), through a Likert scale (1 to 5).The aim is to see whether there is a general agreement as to the core competencies and to collect, comments about the domains and areas included.The survey is anonymous but the participation of epidemiologists from different public health administrations of all EU Member States is especially welcome.To take part, please visit: http://www.ecdc.europa.eu/online_survey.html.The survey is open until 31 August 2007.