Viewpoints Towards the Future Public Health Technician Position Among the Environmental Health Personnel

Abstract

The purpose of this research project was to analyze and generalize the overall viewpoints of managers as well as PHI/EHOs towards the possible future creation of the new Public Health Technician position as well as to determine any impacts of this position on the PHI/EHOs. Due to the massive baby boomer retirements, there seems to be an apparent shortage of PHIs in the health authorities across Canada. Therefore, one of the ideas being considered in order to meet the future PHI demand is the creation of a Public Health Technician (PHT) position as a follow up to the idea suggested by Dr. Richard Musto, Executive Medical Director, Calgary Health Region. For the purposes of this project, the author invited PHI/EHOs as well as managers, directors and MHOs from various health authorities across Canada to complete a 3-5 minutes survey comprising of 14 questions via e-mail. The participants were given two weeks from February 6th to February 20th 2009 to complete the survey and send in their responses. The data collected was then analyzed using a Chi-Square Test with the help of the NCSS software at a significant level of α = 0.05. The Chi-square test determined that there is no association between the current status of employment of the public health personals and their belief that there is a shortage of PHIs in Canada (p-value = 0.43). The test also determined that there is no association between the current status of employment of the participants and whether or not they believed that the creation of the new PHT position would solve the problem of the perceived shortage of PHIs in Canada (p-value = 0.76). Overall, of the 77 public health personals who were surveyed, 61% believed that there is a shortage of PHIs in Canada. 91% of the participants had heard about the incoming of the PHT position and 65% believed that the creation of the technician position will not help solve this problem of shortage of PHIs in Canada. Most of them believed that increasing more awareness about the PHI profession would be a better alternative in dealing with the PHI shortage than creating a PHT position.