Can Syndromic Surveillance Data be Useful for Monitoring Respiratory Illness Activity?

A significant amount of resources and effort have been recently invested in syndromic surveillance systems. However, how these systems complement or compare with traditional public health surveillance systems, such as outbreak reporting, is not clear.  

Objective:

The purpose of this paper is to describe the value of outbreak and syndromic surveillance data from the Electronic Surveillance System for the Early Notification of Community-based Epidemics (ESSENCE) syndromic surveillance system to monitor respiratory illness activity in Maryland.