Develop and deliver educational resources to promote and support mental health resiliency in animal health responders and producers

A comprehensive needs assessment will include a survey and a GAP analysis and will be completed in collaboration with an advisory group of experts and stakeholders. The survey will examine perceived/desired mental health training needs for two audiences: USDA and state agriculture and animal health responders and livestock producers who are involved in emergency response. The GAP analysis will include a literature review examining currently available research on mental health in veterinary/animal health responders as well as information that can be extrapolated from the more general literature pertaining to veterinary mental health (e.g., euthanasia in private practice) or responder mental health (e.g., mental health in public health emergency responders). Informed by the results of the GAP analysis and needs assessment, which will be collated into a summary document, a series of free, online interactive, scenario-based training modules will be developed, to include six 15-20 minute modules for responders and six 15-20 minute modules for livestock producers, for a total of approximately four hours of instruction. Scenarios will encom pass a variety of species and commodities (beef and dairy cattle, swine, poultry, sheep and goats), operation sizes, and management types. Scenarios will also be crafted to be applicable to multiple audiences of affiliated stakeholders (e.g., modules for responders could be used as exercises for training students or other volunteers guided by their leaders), for a broad impact on mental health resiliency. The training modules for animal health responders will be submitted for race CE approval, and all modules will be made available on a dedicated webpage. Availability and importance of the modules will be widely promoted through draft notices and articles distributed via associations, listservs, and press releases to the project's beneficiaries, which include animal health responders within state and federal government, livestock producers, as well as affiliated stakeholders, all of whom will benefit from awareness of strategies and tools to support mental health resiliency during an animal health or agricultural emergency.