As part of the Public Health Agency of Canada’s program on public health prevention and adaptation to climate change, Pr. Jean-Philippe Waaub (GERAD, UQÀM) and his team, in collaboration with the faculty of veterinary medicine (University of Montreal) have been tasked with a project on "Knowledge transfer and capacity building for decision support tools for the management of Lyme disease and other vector-borne diseases in the context of climate change adaptation".

The ultimate goal of this project is widespread dissemination and use of Multicriteria and Multi-stakeholder decision aid tools for the management of vector-borne diseases in Canada, adapted to the needs as well as the expectations of the attendees.  

This workshop aims to transfer knowledge and lessons learnt during the implementation of a previous project on Lyme disease management titled: "Information for adaptation to the risks due to vector-borne diseases".  

More specifically, this workshop will introduce attendees to the basic principles and methods of Multicriteria decision aid, using case studies on Lyme disease and West Nile Virus, thereby allowing participants to become familiar with both the theoretical and practical aspects of this approach.  

Workshop success will depend on participant interaction and a full hour has been dedicated to exchange and discussion at the end of the workshop.

Objective

·         To familiarize attendees of the usefulness and basic concepts of a Multicriteria decision aid approach in public health through an interactive simulation of a case study applied to vector-borne diseases and by using the software Visual PROMETHEE.    
 

Useful IT tools for the workshop

Within the framework of this workshop, the Academic Edition of the Visual PROMETHEE multicriteria software is available as a free download at: http://www.promethee-gaia.net/academic-edition.html (in English); and http://www.promethee-gaia.net/FR/academic-edition.html  (in French). This software is available for PC only (Windows XP, Vista, 7 and above).