About Participatory Epidemiology

Participatory epidemiology (PE) is the use of participatory approaches and methods to improve understanding of animal diseases and veterinary services, and to design solutions to disease problems with livestock keepers. PE draws heavily on systems of learning and action such as Rapid Rural Appraisal and Participatory Rural Appraisal.

Some important features of PE are:

• Respect for local concerns and knowledge
  PE works on the principle that livestock keepers often possess detailed knowledge on animal diseases and can conduct their own problem analysis and research. Livestock workers can use PE as a stand-alone approach, or PE can be combined with conventional veterinary investigation and research methods.
• Use of participatory methods
  The three main groups of participatory methods viz. informal interviews, visualisation and ranking/scoring methods, are all used in PE.
• Triangulation
  The process of using different methods and sources of information to crosscheck findings. Triangulation in PE includes the use of secondary data, and conventional veterinary investigation and epidemiological methods.

Participatory epidemiology is a relatively new branch of epidemiology which is still developing. The approach is based on qualitative inquiry and complements the qualitative nature of standard veterinary investigation procedures. According to the needs of a given community or organisation, participatory epidemiology can also combine the benefits of participatory approaches and methods with quantitative inquiry.