Waukesha County partners with Carroll University to train contact tracers

WAUKESHA COUNTY (CBS 58) -- Waukesha County has partnered with Carroll University to help train contact tracers. 

The program, administered by Carroll University, is a curriculum that has helped increase the number of contact tracers while also allowing staff who have been helping with contact tracing to return to their normal roles, according to the county. 

"Really built the entire curriculum around what our public health nurses had been doing in the contact tracing efforts. As the county started to hire more contact tracers, over the course of the last several months, we developed this training to really mimic the work they are doing and prepare those that workforce to become contact tracers for Waukesha County Public Health," said Lisa Roberts, Deputy Director for the Department of Health and Human Services. 

Roberts said pre-coronavirus, there were eight public health nurses that would handle contact tracing. Now, she says, there are 225, with 155 of them being trained through Carroll University. 

"The county had a need and within weeks we had a curriculum that could meet their needs," said Mark Blegen, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs at Carroll University. 

Blegen says the training is online. There are two programs: contact investigation and disease investigation. He said they are self-paced and are completed in two or three days. 

"Modules include strategies to stop the spread, investigation protocols, applying that knowledge to real case scenarios, a focus on health disparities," he said. 

Blegen said the curriculum is updated every week to make sure it is up to CDC and state guidelines. 

"Makes us feel wonderful we can reach this community need."