A lot of information and data flows in and out of the Spokane Regional Health District (SRHD). This information both reflects and helps us shape our community. It’s important to have a dedicated team who can help others understand what information is important, how to evaluate it, and how it can be used to guide public health. One member of that team is Sara Rodgers.

Sara is a research scientist who evaluates health programing as part of her role with the Quality Planning and Assessment team. When the pandemic hit, she was reassigned to help with the response as well. She began helping with COVID-19 case investigations and contact tracing. Soon she was training new investigators and helping assign new COVID-19 cases to the appropriate staff. With the recent decrease in COVID-19 case rates in our community, Sara is finally able to focus on her role as a program evaluator. She meets with community partners to discuss surveys that gather data for SRHD’s team to evaluate. This helps partners get the data they need to make choices about public health programs. She is also continually working with her team on current projects and how to improve the quality of what SRHD offers to partners.

Sara’s favorite thing about her job at SRHD is the team of people she gets to work with. “They are some of the coolest people I’ve met,” she explained. “They make me excited to come to work. I learn something new from them every day.”

In fact, when asked what she wishes she could share with the community about SRHD, she replied, “It’s easy to see that for most people here this isn’t just a job. They go above and beyond, and many people have dedicated decades to this work and are really invested in public health and helping our community.”

SRHD is lucky to have somebody as hard-working and flexible as Sara on the team, especially throughout the increased intensity of the pandemic. As things begin to adjust back to a new normal there was one last important question to ask Sara. Which song is she blasting on her first post-pandemic road trip? With the certainty you would expect from a research scientist, she responded, “Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen – Is there any other road trip song?!”