A 5-day training course for trainers in Participatory Epidemiology (PE) will be held in Lomé (Togo) from 25 until 29 of January 2010.

The 11 participants were selected from the 29 Participatory Disease Surveillance (PDS) practitioners trained in Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire and Togo as part of the Early Detection Reporting Surveillance – Avian Influenza in Africa (EDRSAIA) project. This is the first training for trainers in PE to be conducted for Francophone countries in West Africa.

Objectives of the training workshop

By the end of the workshop, the participants will be able to:

1. Describe the basic principles of adult learning and apply them to training programs.

2. Describe the key elements that define Participatory Epidemiology (PE) and Participatory Disease Surveillance (PDS).

3. Design, plan and implement PE training, including:

• Training in the development and testing of a PE hypothesis.
• Training in the development of a PE checklist.
• Training in the use of PE tools such as semi-structured interviews, ranking techniques and visualisation techniques.
• Action plan and field monitoring for trainees.

4. Record and analyse information received and understand ways to use this information at different levels.

5. Understand the roles, benefits and limitations of PE/PDS in disease surveillance and research and be able to apply facilitation techniques with decision makers and donors to support its use.