1. pH 1 …far from neutral
V O L U M E 1 I S S U E 3 D E C E M B E R
Who’s got the X Factor…?
In this Issue... Welcome to this special Of course, the real questions every-
one wants to know the answer to
edition of pH1, intended to are: who will the judges decide has
Who’s got the X Fac-
bring you all the information you the most innovative ideas and who
tor? 1
need to know to sign up to and get has made the most impact on pub-
involved with Public Health Fu- lic health. Which Deanery has the
What does the Future tures, the 2010 Trainee Collo-
Hold? 2 trainees with the X Factor??
quium (I love the word colloquium,
but can‟t justify using it that often,
Getting with the so will revert to conference in the
Programme 3-4 next paragraph!).
Weblinks 4 This colloquium is being organised
by Informing Healthier Choices
Public Health Futures which, as Penny Cole explains in
Twitter Updates 4 her article, has been the pioneer-
ing force for some key public
Public Health Futures health projects in the past couple
Conference 5-6 of years. Contact details for the conference
in the form of website, email ad-
The Technical Bits: This conference is specifically de- dresses and twitter account are
Registering for the signed for Public Health trainees provided throughout the newsletter.
Conference & Submit- and is intended to inform and in- However, if you have any additional
spire, both from the work of the queries, please drop us a line at
ting your Work 7
IHC and from our own work. With pH1mail@yahoo.co.uk.
the backing of Sir Muir Gray and
Key Conference Facts
the Training Programme Directors, We will be back with our regular
8
it now just remains for us to regis- newsletter in January, so please
ter for the conference, sign up for get any articles for this edition to us
Join the Team 8 twitter alerts and get thinking caps by December 15th. Have a Fantas-
on to come up with that killer slide tic Christmas, may your on calls be
Travelling Far? 8 that is going to leave the rest of us quiet, and we wish you a very
speechless! healthy New Year!
If you have difficulty reading this newsletter format, a black and white version is also available.
Please e-mail ph1mail@yahoo.co.uk to request a plain format copy. Thanks.

2. What does the
Future Hold?
The first is the writings of Karl The IHC project has been
Muir Gray looks Popper, particularly „The Open creating tools for the fu-
into his crystal Society and its Enemies‟, in ture. Trainees are the peo-
which he argues convincingly ple of the future and the
ball and gives us
that no-one is clever enough colloquium allows us time
food for to be given the power to plan to examine how trainees
thought ahead the future. On the off chance and these tools can best
that there ever was such a be brought together to im-
of the Trainee person, they would soon be- prove the health of indi-
Colloquium... come institutionalized if given viduals and populations, in
absolute power because they addition to creating enjoy-
The future is not a desti- would be cut off from all criti- able work for public health
nation, like Mars waiting cism. professionals!
for our arrival or discov-
ery. It is more like Regent‟s The second source is theories
Park, something that has to on complex adaptive systems,
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be imagined, planned and or solution creat-
created. But how is this best ing systems.
done? One approach is to These describe
leave it to those already in how solutions
charge. can be created
on the border
However, although their ex- between chaos
perience is useful, they are and order.
also the people who have Crowd sourcing,
created our present world getting the ob-
and there is much that is servations of
wrong with it. Another ap- lots of people, is
proach is to leave it to the part of this the-
planners… but the future ory. Equally im-
cannot be created by a bu- portant however
reaucracy. is the participa-
tion of people in
I have found two sources of the creation of
ideas very helpful in thinking solutions.
about the future:

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Getting with the Programme
Penny Cole gets us up to speed with IHC
You may not have heard of velopment. The modular ap- The programme has four over-
Informing Healthier Choices proach used means courses are all aims:
(IHC), but the chances are that useful not only for public health
you have used one of its prod- intelligence professionals, but for 1. Improved workforce capac-
ucts. Amongst the programme’s any organisation that needs to use ity and capability.
highlights are Health Profiles, or generate useful health intelli- 2. Improved data and the tools
the APHO Disease Prevalence gence. to use it
Models, the National Library for 3. Creation of stronger organi-
Public Health and the Health Im- sations using intelligence ap-
pact Assessment Gateway. propriately
4. Creating web-based support.
Established in 2007 to support
the Choosing Health initiative, Many of the tools and products
IHC set out to give fresh impetus have been commissioned from
and invest resources in tools and APHO, and the IC is a key
training for public health intelli- partner in the delivery of Aim
gence. It has improved the career 4.
structure for public health pro-
fessionals, with new standard- It was important to involve or- IHC supports World Class
ised job descriptions, person ganisations from across the sector Commissioning in a number of
specifications and suggested pay in running the programme, and ways. By the time the pro-
grades that can be shared and the IHC steering group has repre- gramme is completed in March
adapted by any employer. sentatives from DH, PCTs, the 2010, there will be a range of
Faculty of Public Health, Asso- accessible and straightforward
It has produced an extensive ciation of Public Health Observa- training for commissioners,
range of on-line training pack- tories (APHO) and the Informa-
ages, to support professional de- tion Centre (IC). (Continued on next page…)

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(Continued from previous page...) supporting them to use intelligence more effectively.
Tools such as the Community Health Profiles and Disease Prevalence Models have already become part
of the backbone of evidence-based commissioning. And they are also being used to deliver crucial intelli-
gence for Joint Strategic Needs Assessments.
To ensure that all the public services are doing their bit to improve the health of communities and address
health inequalities, IHC has delivered a new methodology for Health Impact Assessment. Policymakers
and analysts in any field can use it to test the impact their policies will have on the health of communities
or populations.
At www.informinghealthierchoices.net you can access all the products the programme has delivered, but
the IHC team wants to ensure trainees fully share in the programme’s outcomes.
That’s why IHC’s final activity is the trainee conference planned for February 23 rd 2010, where all the
outcomes, products, tools etc. will be presented. Trainees too will have an opportunity to ‘show and tell’
about their own initiatives and activities. They will also get first look at the new Public Health Portal
which is being developed by the NHS IC as part of the IHC programme.
WEBLinks:
www.healthprofiles.org.uk for the health profiles
www.hiagateway.org.uk for everything you need to know about Health Impact Assessment
www.healthknowledge.org.uk for all the training
www.apho.org.uk and click ‘Resources’ for the Public Health Skills and Career Framework Guidance, Job and
Person Specifications.
www.apho.org.uk and click ‘Tools” for Disease Prevalence Models
www.library.nhs.uk/publichealth for the National Library of Public Health
Get PH Futures Updates on Twitter!
Keep up to date with the thoughts of the PH Futures team by signing up to follow their tweets. Add your
own tweets and get the debate going before February 23rd!
If you already tweet, visit http://twitter.com/phfutures and follow. Add your thoughts or anything else re-
lated to public health futures by adding #phf to a tweet.
If this is your first twitter experience, visit www.twitter.com and see what all the fuss is about (and yes,
PH futures is following Stephen Fry!).
And if using Twitter seems one tweet too far, all announcements will also be available on
www.phfutures.org.
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EUREKA!
Get your hard work in the Public Health arena noticed at
the Public Health Futures Conference
Have you had a brilliant public health idea in the past couple of years?
Dying to share it with fellow public health enthusiasts? The Public Health Futures Confer-
ence is the place where your voice can be heard! Your work will be appraised by an experi-
enced panel of public health specialists and the most innovative/interesting/inspiring sub-
missions will be asked to present on the day. Outstanding submissions will be presented
with signed copies of Bad Science by Ben Goldacre and book tokens (not necessarily ear-
marked for more Ben Goldacre publications!). There are 2 options as to how you present
your submissions. Dr Gillian Schiller explains the brief in detail.
1. “Killer Slides”
Trainees are invited to submit a slide which has acted as a call to action in the arena of
Public Health. (For inspiration, consider the highly publicised “Jubilee Line” image, page 6.)
The work this slide represents must have been undertaken within the last 2 calendar years
in the UK. To allow the judges to understand your thinking and process behind the slide, you
will need to submit a short report addressing each of the 4 judging criteria (below), using
not more than 200 words to respond to each criteria (for how to submit both the killer slide
and the accompanying short report, see “The Technical Bit” article, page 7).
Eligibility: The work must have been undertaken within the last 2 calendar years within the
UK (i.e. From 1 January 2008).
Judging criteria: The judges will be seeking a slide which best meets the following criteria:
1. Presents a clear, focused message that is easy to understand.
2. Pleasing to the eye!
3. Has clear potential to help a decision be made (or has realised that potential).
4. Demonstrates one or more of the 10 public health competencies (see
www.fphm.org.uk/training/curriculum/what_you_learn/ph_competencies.asp).
Closing date for submission: 15 January 2010.
(Continued on next page...)
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6. (Continued P A G E 6
from previous page...)
2. Projects using Health Intelligence
Have you used health intelligence to leverage a decision about a policy direction, a service de-
velopment, a partnership activity or other change? The work can be from any part of public
health, and may encompass areas such as communication of public health issues or use of tools
and techniques in creative ways. The panel are looking for trainees who have taken an innova-
tive approach to their chosen issue, and will be as pleased to receive submissions from those
approaches which did not have the desired impact as from those which were outstanding suc-
cesses.
For this format, you will need to submit a summary of the project, along with a short report
addressing each of the 4 judging criteria (below), using not more than 200 words to respond to
each criteria (for how to submit these documents, see “The Technical Bit” article on page 7).
Eligibility: The work must have been undertaken within the last 2 calendar years within the UK
(i.e. From 1 January 2008).
Selection criteria: Work will be chosen that best demonstrates:
1. A topic area likely to be important in the coming years.
2. A clear reason for choosing the approach taken. There will be particular focus on
innovative use of techniques or tools.
3. A clear description of the outcome and its impact (or reasons for lack of success and
impact if appropriate).
4. Learning points from the project.
Closing date for submission: 15 January 2010.
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7. The Technical Bits...
Ben Toth, IHC’s resident technical guru, tells us how to sign up and
submit our work for the conference
Signing up for the Public Health Futures Conference
Public Health Futures have a dedicated website: http://www.phfutures.org. You will need to register on
this website to secure your place. Tickets are free but places are limited. After registering you will receive
a confirmation e-mail with a ticket attached, which you should bring on the day. You will also be able to
see a location map and add the conference to your calendar. There is also a page on the website that
allows you to post your thoughts on the upcoming conference and as work is uploaded (see below), you
will be able to visit the site and look at people‟s “killer slides”.
Uploading your Work to the Conference Website:
Work for both the killer slide and the health intelligence brief will be submitted in the form of a single
powerpoint presentation.
For killer slides: please upload a presentation consisting of your killer slide followed by one slide ad-
dressing each of the 4 judging criteria (1 presentation, 5 slides in total).
For health intelligence work: please upload a presentation consisting of your summary slides first
(maximum of 2) followed by one slide addressing each of the judging criteria (1 presentation, maximum of
6 slides).
If you have a Slideshare account:
1. Upload your presentation to Slideshare. Add information about the presentation, including #phf in the
tag field.
2. Go to http://www.slideshare.net/event/public-health-futures/join.
3. Return to your presentation, click on More… and add your presentation to the Public Health Futures
Event (Figure 1).
Figure 1. Adding a
Presentation to an
Event
If you don’t have a slideshare account:
1. Make sure your slide includes your Name and email address
2. Send your slide as an e-mail attachment to child23earth@upload.slideshare.net and (importantly) cc
ben.toth@gmail.com. That will enable us to add your presentation to the event and let you know how to
view it.

8. And finally...
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Key Conference Facts
Date: 23rd February 2010
Time: 10:00 – 16:30
Invitees: Public Health Trainees
Public Health Dental Trainees
Public Health Analyst Trainees
Public Health Academic Associates
Training Programme Directors
Informing Healthier Choices Team
Register your place at: www.phfutures.org
Sign up for the Evening Reception (22nd February 2010) at: http://phfeveningreception.eventbrite.com/
Sign up for the National Trainee Website Team: Email: ben.toth@gmail.com
Deadline for submitting work: 15th January 2010 (see page 7 for instructions)
Conference Content: Workshops led by Informing Healthier Choices Team
Trainee presentations & discussions of killer slides & health intelligence projects
Keynote Speakers: Sir Liam Donaldson & Professor Sir Michael Marmot
National Public Health Trainee Website: Travelling Far?
Join the Team!
Much as London might aspire to be the centre of the
Following the Public Health Futures conference universe, most of us will still have to travel some way
in February 2010, www.phfutures.org will be- to get to the King‟s Fund on February 23 rd. If you would
come a National website for Public Health prefer to travel down the night before, Muir Gray and
Trainees. If you would like to be part of the the IHC team have arranged a reception at the King‟s
website team that leads in the development of Fund on the evening of February 22nd to catch up with
this resource, please email Ben Toth at fellow trainees from other Deaneries.
ben.toth@gmail.com. Ben is the IHC IT guru
and will be leading a session on website devel- Places are limited due to the size of the room, but if
opment at the February conference for every- you are not travelling far and would like the opportunity
one who expresses an interest in being part of to join us, we will see how many we can squeeze in!
the team. To reserve your place at the evening reception, please
register at http://phfeveningreception.eventbrite.com/.
If you have difficulty reading this newsletter format, a black and white version is also available.
Please e-mail ph1mail@yahoo.co.uk to request a plain format copy. Thanks.
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