Epi-on-the-Island 2008 was held in conjunction with the Annual General Meeting of the Canadian Association of Veterinary Epidemiology and Preventive medicine (CAVEPM) at UPEI at the end of May. This year participants from across North America and as far away as Switzerland, Finland and the United Kingdom came to participate in the two courses offered by Epi-on-the-Island. A three-day course on systematic reviews and meta-analysis was put on by Drs. Andrijana Rajic (Public Health Agency of Canada), Javier Sanchez (Canadian Food Inspection Agency), Ian Dohoo (UPEI) and Henrik Stryhn (UPEI). This was followed by a course on the use of the North American Animal Disease Spread Model (NAADSM) put on by the collaborative group that has overseen the development of that program (including Drs. Bruce McNab (OMAFRA) and Caroline Dube (CFIA)). Both courses were filled to capacity and were very well reviewed by the course participants. Plans for Epi-on-the island 2009 will be posted this fall.