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The Food Handling Practices Model (FHPM) Version 1.1

Client: U.S. Food and Drug Administration, Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition
Period of Performance: 8/17/01 - 3/31/03
RTI Project Leader: Dr. David L. Kendall
RTI Project Number: 8184-001
FDA Project Officer: Dr. Angela Ritzert

Each year millions of cases of foodborne illness occur in the United States. Preceding most cases of foodborne illness is contamination by pathogens and failure to destroy or sufficiently control pathogens in retail and foodservice establishments or households. FDA under contract with RTI International developed a quantitative simulation model of the effects of contributing factors on the incidence of foodborne illness.

The food handling practices model is a computer simulation model that allows users to estimate how one or more changes in food handling practices at the retail, foodservice, or household level may affect the annual number of food-related illnesses in the US. The model operates by simulating, tracking, and counting servings of food that become contaminated with one or more pathogens, followed by survival and growth of pathogens and subsequent ingestion that results in foodborne illness. The model does not track or count servings of food that are not contaminated with pathogens.

INSTRUCTIONS

  1. You must have Microsoft Excel and Access and version 4.5 of @RISK on your PC to run this model.
  2. Download ZIP file which contains all model files. ZIP (488 KB)
    ZIP file contains  
    • three Excel workbook files:  
      • FHPM.xls (1.59 MB)
      • FHPMGraph.xls (228 KB)
      • FHPMStats.xls (136 KB)
    • one Access database file:  
      • BaselineScenarios.mdb (952 KB) 
  3. Click on FHPM.xls to run the model using the easy-to-use user interface. (For more detailed instructions on how to use the FHPM, please read the user's guide)

Minimum Software Requirements

The model runs Monte Carlo simulations using MS Excel and Palisade @Risk. The model retrieves data from a database file stored in Microsoft Access. The FHPM requires the following minimum software versions to operate:

Documentation

 

Date added to FoodRisk.org: April 27, 2004

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