Influenza is an important public health problem associated with considerable morbidity and mortality. A disease traditionally monitored via legally mandated reporting, researchers have identified alternative data sources for influenza surveillance. The hospital environment presents a unique opportunity for comparative studies of biosurveillance data with high quality and various level of clinical information ranging from provisional diagnoses to laboratory confirmed cases. This study investigated the alert times achievable from hospital-based sources relative to reporting of influenza cases. The earlier detection of influenza could potentially provide more advanced warning for the medical community and the early implementation of precautionary measures in vulnerable populations.
Objective
To determine the relative alert time of influenza surveillance based on hospital data sources compared to notifiable disease reporting.