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Article History

Received: 13 July 2018

Accepted: 7 January 2019

First Online: 25 January 2019

Ethics approval and consent to participate

: The DPH Institutional Review Board has reviewed the study protocol and the data safety and monitoring plan and determined that this project constitutes Program Evaluation Activities and does not meet the definition of human subject research according to federal Human Subject Protection Rules (45 CFR Part 46); therefore, MDPH IRB oversight is not required. The University of Massachusetts Medical School and University of Massachusetts Lowell IRBs concurred with the above decision.Informed voluntary consent is obtained from individual employees for their participation in the Needs and Interests surveys. All participation is strictly voluntary; workers are given the opportunity to refuse participation without prejudice to their employment situations. No name or other personal identifiers are collected. All hard copy questionnaires will be maintained in locked file cabinets. All study data in electronic form will be kept on University computers that are password-protected and with secure back-ups.All investigators have received regular NIH-approved education on the protection of human subject participants in research.

: Not applicable.

: The author(s) declare that they have no competing interests.

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