How To Become An Environmental Health Practitioner

Hello, I'm Sherridan Hughes. I'm a career consultant and career analyst. I'm going to talk to you today about how to get into various careers.

Environmental health practitioners are advisers, educators, consultants, and inspectors or polices of health in the environment, be it in homes, housing or businesses. They're most known for rats in restaurants, going to inspect the food preparation areas and ensure that the place meets the standards being required, but also for noise abatement, and for being the people who knock on doors when something's partying too often too late. So, it's really the people who are ensuring that the environment around us is safe, that is free from chemical hazards, the water isn't polluted, that the businesses are a healthy places to work, and that food and infectious diseases potentially are kept in control as well.

So, anything about health in the environment would be part of their responsibility. To become an environmental health practitioner, one does need to be a graduate and normally, it would be an environmental health degree or a scientific degree followed by a masters in environmental health, and then you know, on the job training and practical training once actually in a job. Environmental health practitioners need to have good communication skills and people skills.

They will be going out to environments where perhaps they will not be welcome and they may need to smooth or rate a hotel owner and to pacify people on occasion. They need to be very organized, they will have to do documentation and administrative work to complete as well. They may need to be analytical and good problem solvers and decision makers.

They would also need to be quite physically fit and they would need to have a driving license as a prerequisite as well. The work is proactive as well as reactive, so they will be very involved in various public inquiries in communities and they will be educating the public in good practice in healthy issues, as well as reacting to customer complaints. So, that's just how to become an environmental health practitioner. .