BC Environmental and Occupational Health Research Network

~ This program is closed and material here is for archived purposes. The Policy Makers Roundtable culminated in the Spring 2010 Conference. ~

Policy Makers Roundtable

Who should participate?
Policy makers, research users, decision makers and researchers to discuss issues of mutual interest.

Why should you participate?
- To identify new research questions
- To disseminate research results
- To develop strategies for facilitating these in an ongoing manner

Interested in participating? Contact us.

Background

The Roundtable was formed in late 2008 with BCEOHRN members coming together to discuss ways in which research users and researchers could collaborate and build new initiatives. Meetings are held via WebEx as a forum for the group.

The group identified the following themes:

From the research community:
• Policy perspective, WorkSafeBC assisting researchers with questions.
• How decisions are made: are cost/benefit analyses done? What is the process at the provincial level / federal level?
• Environmental management systems: how / if they are implemented at the institutional level and how they are perpetuated with monitoring and feedback from collecting data.

From the policy makers’ community:
• Epidemiology, statistics, policy review.
• Direction of research in H&S issues across industries to adopt practices, develop questions.
• Sharing data with researchers outside of policy review and compliance: Ministry of Energy & Mines has occupational hygiene data since the 1950s, warehoused in paper form.

Some ideas for topics of future Roundtable discussions from the group include:

1. Data Collection, Analysis & Interpretation. Could include:
2. Bridging researchers-policy makers:
- How can researchers influence policy development and how can policy makers engage researchers to provide input in guiding policy?
- How are decisions made at different government levels?
3. Population level exposures to endocrine disruptors.
4. Biological monitoring / monitoring workplace hazards:
5. Safety culture: prevention of occupational illness - how is it examined, assessed, managed, transformed?
6. Ergonomics and human factors policy development.