Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: overview and functions

CDC

The Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are essentially organized around its primary office, the Office of the Director. In this capacity, director Thomas R. Frieden serves as the president or perhaps the CEO of this entity. Frieden is aided by his second in command, Ileana Arlas, whose formal title is Principal Deputy Director. There are numerous other positions within this office, which serve to oversee and designate authority among the various facets of public health in which the CDC is involved. These include different areas of science, communication, and minority health equity, among others.

This principle entity, the Office of the Director, designates its authority over four chief agencies that are linked, somewhat, to the various positions that others serve within the Office of the Director. These four additional branches of the CDC include the Office for State, Tribal, Local and Territorial Support, the Office of Public Health Scientific Services, the Office of Noncommunicable Diseases, Injury, and Environmental Health, and the Office of Infectious Diseases. All of these offices are headed by personnel entitled deputy directors. In the aforementioned sequence these deputy directors include Judith Monroe, Chesley Richards, Robin Ikeda, and Rima Khabbaz.

These four areas are the different segments of specialization that the CDC concentrates on in providing public health to society at large. The Office of State, Tribal, Local and Territorial Support concentrates on the local needs of different populations served by the CDC, whereas the Office of Public Health and Scientific Services focuses more on technological and scientific research to assist in administering public health policy. The remaining two offices, respectively, concentrate on noncommunicable and on infectious diseases.

Due to the different areas of specialization that these four codifications of the CDC cover, it is logical that the aforementioned deputy directors require varying competencies in order to best assist them with their own particular area of specialty. It is noteworthy to mention that all of the personnel listed within this document are medical doctors, and that this basic core knowledge of medicine and its practice is a skill set common to all of the respective offices. However, the director of the Public Health and Scientific Services office, for example, should be both technologically and scientifically competent and have a background in this particular aspect of public health. Doing so will enable him to keep abreast of the scientific research most necessary to fulfilling specific objectives of the CDC. Similarly, it is fairly vital that the director of the office for state, tribal, local and territorial support is a good communicator, as well as a staunch advocate for the local entities and citizens that are affected by CDC's policies. This is necessary so that the actual administration of treatment -- at the local level -- does not become lost in a sea of federal and international bureaucracy.

Communication is another valuable competency for he deputy director of the Noncommunicable Diseases, Injury, and Environmental Health office -- for the simple fact that this office covers what might be disparate aspects of health care. Such a director would need to be able to discern the causes and effects of these various maladies both at the micro and at the macro level in order to effect proper treatment. The competencies required of the deputy director of the office of Infectious Diseases, for instance, vary slightly. This individual must be well versed in contemporary research possibilities and opportunities to mitigate the spread of diseases, as well as have access to the requisite supplies to best counteract them.

The CDC has a very wide role facilitating public health that occurs at the local, national, and global levels. There are several different facets of this organization's approach to effecting public health. Foremost of its responsibilities is the fact that "It remains at the forefront of public health efforts to prevent and control infectious and chronic diseases, injuries, workplace hazards, disabilities, and environmental health threats" (CDC, 2013). Moreover, it attempts to reach these goals from a multi-faceted approach which involves on-site investigations of certain conditions and maladies that are endemic to particular regions. It also is quite instrumental in conducting research into the causes of problems as well as of potential solutions to diseases and conditions which are both infectious and otherwise. Additionally, it is noteworthy to mention that various CDC employees are also in the field actually responding to incidents and emergencies soon after they happen, and applying treatment to various individuals who have been adversely affected by different events in the world. One of the ways in which it operates in the field is to help guard "against international disease transmission, with personnel stationed in more than 25 foreign countries" (CDC, 2013).

In addition to being reactive in working against outbreaks and helping to counteract noxious conditions once they occur, the CDC also takes a quite proactive, preventative approach to aiding public health. It provides a monitoring system for certain malicious conditions within the United States, and works closely with various territories at the state level to do so. It keeps and updates a plethora of statistics regarding any number of salutary conditions to keep the general public informed about what threats are current or impending in the future. It also is instrumental at working with places around the world to help them create health policies that benefits both individuals and collectives in a tangible way. As such,

CDC is now focusing on becoming a more efficient and impactful agency by focusing on five strategic areas: supporting state and local health departments, improving global health, implementing measures to decrease leading causes of death, strengthening surveillance and epidemiology, and reforming health policies (CDC, 2013).