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Advancing Conformance With The Fda Retail Program Standards in Yellowstone County

Objective

Advancing Conformance with the FDA Retail Program Standards in Yellowstone CountyProject SummaryThe purpose of this project is to decrease the incidence of foodborne illness in YellowstoneCounty with efficient and effective use of public resources. The Centers for Disease Control andPrevention (CDC) estimates that foodborne illness sickens 1 in 6 Americans each year. Theoccurrence of foodborne illness, however, is grossly underreported, and therefore an unreliablemeasurement of the effectiveness of food safety programs. The risk factors that contribute tofoodborne illness as identified by the CDC are more readily measured and can be used as aprogram measure.Our project proposes is to accomplish the following goals:¿ To identify foodborne illness risk factors in priority order and develop strategies to reduce their occurrence.¿ To evaluate trends over time to determine whether progress is being made toward reduction the occurrence of foodborne illness risk factors.¿ To increase the conformance of our food safety program with the FDA Voluntary National Retail Regulatory Program Standards.The initial phase of the project will be to collect baseline data on the occurrence of risk factors infast food and full service restaurants, delis, school cafeterias, hospitals, and nursing homes.These risk factors will be prioritized by frequency and strategies planned to reduce theiroccurrence. Plans will be implemented through years 2, 3 and 4 of the project. Interventionsmay include food safety training, public campaigns and web-based instruction. Plans will also beimplemented to train the Food Safety Inspection Officers (FSIOs) in inspection techniques andcompliance skills. These will uniformly be tailored to address the most prevalent risk factorsidentified.As a final phase in this five year cycle, data will be collected and analyzed a second time tomeasure our progress and guide further work.The Food Safety Program in Yellowstone County is guided by the mission of RiverStone Healthto 'Improve Life, Health, and Safety' in our community. By bringing our program into greaterconformance with the Retail Program Standards, we expect to achieve a reduction in theoccurrence of risk factors for foodborne illness in our community, to strengthen our relationshipswith the retail food industry, and to use our resources more efficiently and effectively.

Investigators
Tapia, Marilyn
Institution
Yellowstone City-County Health Department
Start date
2012
End date
2017
Project number
5U18FD004682-05