The health system of Senegal is organized according to a pyramidal structure at three levels: central, intermediate constituted by the medical and peripheral regions called health district.
The central level includes, in addition to the minister’s office, the general secretariat, departments and related services. The intermediate level or medical region, whose area of intervention corresponds to that of the administrative region, ensures the coordination, supervision, inspection and control of public and private health structures in the region. The peripheral level or health district is the most peripheral operational unit of the health pyramid and constitutes the health subdivision closest to the populations.
Health information collected at the peripheral and intermediate level is transmitted once a week to the central level, which is responsible for surveillance and alert.
According to the report of the National Health Development Plan (PNDS 2009-2018), these information circuits set up, for various reasons, are not operational and therefore can not allow the rapid detection of any morbid or fatal event . One of the solutions recommended in the PNDS report to remedy the dysfunction of these information circuits is to train, as a priority, health personnel at the level of the health district, which is the point of convergence for the integration of epidemiological surveillance functions.
It should be noted that thanks to its HIV / AIDS surveillance system, Senegal is cited as a reference country in Africa in the fight against AIDS. Indeed, seroprevalence in the general population is estimated at 0.7% by the Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) IV (2005).
From 1998 to 2004, training in epidemiology of intervention was provided by the Agency of Preventive Medicine (AMP) at the African Center for Higher Education in Management (CESAG) in Dakar, it allowed the training of 248 professionals in the field African, 74 (30%) Senegalese, later relocated to Benin. Since then, a training focused on field epidemiology is no longer provided in Senegal, while there is a need and a real need to follow this training.
In this context, the Sante Sunugal association and the Laboratory Bacteriology Virology decided to organize in Senegal, a training in intervention epidemiology, to improve the use of epidemiological methods of health professionals in their daily practice. This training will be conducted under the auspices of the Ministry of Health and Social Action (MSAS) and in collaboration with European institutes.
The training corresponds to the adaptation of the course of the Institute for the Development of Applied Epidemiology (IDEA) implemented since 1984 in France, the introductory course of the Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS) organized in Atlanta (US- United) by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), as well as the International Course of Epidemiology and Applied Informatics in Africa (IEIAA) became Epidemiological Surveillance in Africa (SURVEA) organized by the MPA in Benin.