Surveillance Types

Surveillances:Background:Goal:Provide information that can be used for health action by government, public health, and public to guide public health policy and programs. Purposes: Assess public health status, define health priorities, evaluate programs, stimulate research. Collaboration Partners: 911 systems, federal agencies, hospitals, agriculture, schools, industry, etc. Uses: Can identify patients, detect epidemics, estimate magnitude/scope of health problems, develop hypothesis, detect changes in health practices, etc. Four Main Types: Active: Health agencies contact health providers seeking reports to identify possible outbreaks. Ensures more complete reporting of conditions, most appropriate for epidemics where a disease has been targeted for elimination, used in conjunction with specific epidemiological investigations. Passive: Disease reported by health care professional, simple and inexpensive but limited by incompleteness of reporting and variability of quality. Sentinel: Involves only a limited network of carefully selected reporting sites targeting a particular disease. Also goes out into field to investigate. CAN BE ACTIVE OR PASSIVE! Used when high-quality data about a particular disease is needed. Can monitor trends or key health indicators in its location, but may be worse at examining rare diseases as it is only conducted in selected locations. If a rare disease occurs outside of these sentinel sites, Sentinel Surveillance will not be effective. Syndromic: Focuses on one or more symptoms to detect or anticipate outbreaks (especially involving bioterrorism). Identify illness clusters fast. Steps to Surveillance: 1. Data Collection/Reporting. e.g. reported diseases, vital records, surveys. 2. Data Analysis. Usually done by place to identify where illnesses occurred. 3. Data Interpretation. Allows to determine cause of health event. 4. Data Dissemination (Distribution). Data is distributed through PSAs, press and social media, etc. to the general public, health practitioners, etc. 5. Link to Action Determines what must be done to stop the spread of the public health threats (containment).