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Usman Hussain

In November of 2011, the local Public Health unit responsible for the Edmonton area (population 1.2mil) was alerted to an individual meeting the case definition for measles in the ED. A key part of the management strategy was to identify contacts to the index case, perform a risk assessment and, if applicable, inform them of the risk. Given the transmission characteristics, the risk for this group was defined as those present within the geographic area/environment of the index case within a specified time period. Public Health utilized the established manual lookup of hospital records and piloted an automated data query through the syndromic surveillance system, ARTSSN. This served as opportunity to validate the ability to generate a contact list, based on risk geography and time, of the ARTSSN system, and to compare the timeliness of each result.

Objective

Following a clinical case of measles presenting to an urban emergency department (ED), the local health authority sought to identify all patients that might be at risk for disease. This list of contacts was generated through a manual search of hospital records and through a piloted automated data query of the health authority's syndromic surveillance system, Alberta Real Time Syndromic Surveillance Net (ARTSSN). The purpose of this pilot study was to: 1) compare the completeness of the two lookup methods and, 2) describe the time requirements needed for each method.

Submitted by elamb on

Standardized electronic pre-diagnostic information is routinely collected in Alberta, Canada. ARTSSN is an automated real-time surveillance data repository able to rapidly refresh data that include school absenteeism information, calls about health concerns from Health Link Alberta; a provincial telephone service for health advice and information, and emergency department visits categorized by standardized chief complaint. Until recently, real-time ARTSSN data for public health surveillance and decision making has been underutilized.

Objective

We developed early warning algorithms using data from ARTSSN and used them to detect signatures of potential pandemics and provide regular weekly forecasts on influenza trends in Alberta during 2012-2014.

Submitted by rmathes on

Rates of student absenteeism in schools have been mainly used to detect outbreaks in schools and prompt public health action to stop local transmission. A report by Kim Mogto et al.  stated that aggregated counts of school absenteeism (SAi) were correlated with PPFluA, but the sample may have been biased. The purpose of this study was to assess the correlation between aggregated rates of SAi and PPFluA for two cities, Calgary and Edmonton, in Alberta. In such situations, SAi could potentially be used as a proxy for PPFluA when there are not enough samples for stable laboratory estimates.

Objective

To assess the correlations between weekly rates of elementary school absenteeism due to illness (SAi) and percent positivity for influenza A from laboratory testing (PPFluA) when conducted at a city level from September to December over multiple years.

 

Submitted by uysz on

Traditionally, public health surveillance departments collect, analyze, interpret, and package information into static surveillance reports for distribution to stakeholders. This resource-intensive production and dissemination process has major shortcomings that impede end users from optimally utilizing this information for public health action. Often, by the time traditional reports are ready for dissemination they are outdated. Information can be difficult to find in long static reports and there is no capability to interact with the data by users. Instead, ad hoc data requests are made, resulting in inefficiencies and delays.

Use of electronic dashboards for surveillance reporting is not new. Many public health departments have worked with information technology (IT) contractors to develop such technically sophisticated products requiring IT expertise. The technology and tools now exist to equip the public health workforce to develop in-house surveillance dashboards, which allow for unprecedented speed, flexibility, and cost savings while meeting the needs of stakeholders. At Alberta Health Services (AHS), in-house, end-to-end dashboard development infrastructure has been established that provides epidemiologists and data analysts full capabilities for effective and timely reporting of surveillance information. 

Objective

To address the limitations of traditional static surveillance reporting by developing in-house infrastructure to create and maintain interactive surveillance dashboards. 

Submitted by Magou on
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