Santé publique France is France’s national public health agency. A public institution under the authority of the Minister of Health, created through the merger of several public institutions and established by Ordinance 2016-246 of April 15, 2016, the agency works to promote public health. As a scientific, expert, and public health safety agency, its missions include:

1. Epidemiological observation and surveillance of the health status of the population;
2. Monitoring health risks threatening the population;
3. Promoting health and reducing health risks;
4. Developing prevention and health education;
5. Preparation for and response to health threats, alerts, and crises;
6. Issuing public health alerts.

The agency is organized into 12 directorates—some scientific, some cross-functional, and some providing operational support.

The agency’s strategic priorities and work program, established by its Board of Directors, are organized into three areas: Strengthening the capacity for anticipation and rapid response to health threats; Measuring and assessing the extent of diseases and risk factors to guide their prevention and control; Strengthening the health impact of all public policies and the prevention and promotion of health.

Department of Noncommunicable Diseases and Injuries - CaRMeN Unit (Cardiovascular, Respiratory, Metabolic, and Nutrition)

Internship Topic

Optimization of an algorithm for identifying undiagnosed patients with type 2 diabetes and associated risk factors in France, using the CONSTANCES cohort.

In France, despite the healthcare system and the use of frequent fasting blood glucose tests, the CONSTANCES cohort showed that 1.6% of adults aged 18 to 69 had undiagnosed diabetes; a finding confirmed by the Esteban study.

A delayed diagnosis exposes patients to chronic hyperglycemia and thus to a high risk of serious complications (myocardial infarction, stroke, end-stage renal disease, blindness, lower limb amputation). Given the severity and frequency of these complications, it is essential that diabetes be diagnosed early and that treatment be based on lifestyle and dietary measures, and even pharmacological interventions.

Thus, implementing an intervention to improve the early management of type 2 diabetes could help reduce the risk of complications or premature death. One course of action could involve raising collective awareness—among both the general public and healthcare professionals—of the importance of early screening combined with essential diabetes management from the moment of diagnosis to delay the onset of associated complications.

Internship Objectives

Optimization of the developed algorithms:

• Improving the performance of the type 2 diabetes detection algorithm through model fine-tuning.
• Adapting the developed algorithm to other previously targeted T2D populations.

Data visualization:

• Creating data visualizations to illustrate the results obtained.

Scientific dissemination:

• Participation in the writing of scientific articles.
• Opportunity to present findings at team and management meetings.

The scope of the project can be refined following discussion with the intern. Regardless of the project, it will be carried out in collaboration with experts in the field (epidemiologists, diabetologists, etc.)
. The data are available, linked to the SNDS, and hosted on the CASD portal (the intern will be required to complete training on how to access the CASD). Depending on the progress of the analyses, the work may be published as a scientific article or presented at a conference.

Internship Activities

• Literature review
• Development of an analysis protocol
• Descriptive and multivariate statistical analyses
• Development of algorithms
• Data analysis with a focus on generating data to support healthcare decision-making and the implementation of preventive and health promotion measures
• Contribution to the dissemination of results in the form of articles and conference presentations