OU Public Health | Fall 2018 23 Justasfirefightersruntoafirewhileothers run away, public health researchers like Aaron Wendelboe, Ph.D., head straight toward the source of infection while others steer clear. He’s a public health detective, a science sleuth hunting for clues that can pre- vent or halt illness. “I specialize in disease surveillance, which has roots in infectious disease like tracking how serious each influenza season is. I have applied these methods to chronic diseases, including venous thromboembolism,” said Wendelboe, who also is interested in incor- porating the latest technology to make dis- ease surveillance more efficient. The path to epidemiology for Wendelboe ac- tually started when an interest in microbiol- ogy took a detour. “My undergraduate degree was microbiol- ogy, but I struggled because I always had so many questions. I tended to put the cart be- fore the horse, wanting to know how things were working,” he said. “I was drawn to epi- demiology because I felt like we could see the whole picture and push for answers to those questions about how and why – how can I make sense of the data.” Wordslikeanthrax,Ebolaandsalmonellacan soundabitscaryformost,butforWendelboe they trigger questions he feels compelled to answer. What is the source of a pathogen? Where is it spreading and how? What mea- sures can be employed to stop it? The Ebola outbreak of 2014 is just one example. As the world grappled with the most widespread outbreak of Ebola in history, Wendelboe set to work as a fellow working with Dr. James Regens in the OU Center for Intelligence and National Security. “Our goal was to figure out how to use public data to improve national security in the wake of the Ebola outbreak,” he explained. “Even though Oklahoma had no cases of Ebola, it still cost us a lot of money to prepare. We knew we would have people returning to the state from West Africa and we needed to fig- ure out how to handle that. If we had a case, how would we protect health care workers? There are other criti- cal questions too like to what extent do you limit someone’s free- dom? These are all very challenging issues.” Wendelboe knows the risk of an outbreak can sometimes hide in a seemingly inno- cent source. An example of that is the sale of chicks at Easter. “The problem is chicks can carry salmonella. From a public health perspective, we are try- ing to prevent these chicks from having sal- monella, especially those being sold as pets. Theindustryhasworkedtoimplementthings like vaccination, cleaning systems and more to keep hatcheries free from contamination. Yet every year, salmonella is found,” he said. So as part of the Epidemic Intelligence Ser- vice of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Wendelboe took his research to thefield,visitinghatcheriestodiscoverwhere those salmonella prevention efforts were breaking down. With chicken droppings and feathers everywhere, he readily admits the work was not always pretty, but it is essential to protect the public health. As a researcher and associate professor in the College’s Department of Biostatistics and Ep- idemiology, Wendelboe currently conducts surveillanceforvenousthromboembolismor VTE in Oklahoma County. The goal is to es- timate the incidence of a first episode of these dangerous blood clots, as well as recurrent and fatal VTE. He also is working to better understand fac- tors associated with increased incidence of Clostridium difficile in health care settings. C. difficile is a bacterium that can cause severe, even life-threatening, intestinal symptoms. About a half million people in the United States get sick from C. difficile and the infections are becoming more fre- quent, severe and difficult to treat. Wendelboe is especially proud of an NIH-funded project that teams him with biostatisticians and com- puter programmers to develop a more user-friendly software to analyze complex data. “This is an example of teaming up with multidisciplinary experts and translating our research to impact more people,” Wendelboe said. “At the OU Hudson College of Public Health, I am proud to work with a team of smart, hardworking individu- als. We work well together, trust and respect each other and aim to bring our best to both conduct research and train students to im- prove the public’s health.” RESEARCH IN FOCUS Infectious Disease Super Sleuth