Syndromes

The 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa is one of the largest Ebola outbreaks in history. Early detection is critical for rapid initiation of treatment, infection control and emergency response plans. To facilitate clinicians’ ability to detect Ebola, various syndrome definitions have been developed.

Objective

To develop and validate an Ebola virus disease syndrome definition within the GUARDIAN (Geographic Utilization of Artificial Intelligence in Real-Time for Disease Identification and Alert Notification) surveillance system.

The LAC SSS has been in existence since 2004. Currently, the system collects data from over 50 hospitals daily and performs a chief complaint-based syndrome classification analysis of all ED visits. The keyword “fever” is of special interest due to its inclusion within several syndrome category definitions such as influenza, meningitis, etc. However, inclusion of such terms in syndrome definitions may be a disadvantage as such keyword searches would depend upon the consistency in which the term “fever” is reported. In 2014, several LAC syndromic surveillance hospital data connections were upgraded to include notes recording patient body temperature. To evaluate the newly added temperature information, analyses were conducted on those observations that included body temperature, chief complaint, and diagnosis information.

Objective

The Los Angeles County (LAC) Emergency Department (ED) Syndromic Surveillance System (SSS) classifies patients into syndrome categories based on stated chief complaints. In an effort to evaluate the accuracy of patient- stated chief complaints and final diagnoses, both “fever” chief complaints and diagnoses were compared with patient body temperature readings.

NC DETECT receives ICD-9-CM codes for emergency department (ED) visits and uses these codes in case definitions for syndromic surveillance (e.g. infectious disease, injury, etc.). Hospitals will begin using ICD-10-CM codes on October 1, 2015. As a result, preparations have been made to accommodate ICD-10-CM codes in NC DETECT for data transmission, receipt, processing and use in the NC DETECT Web Application.

Objective

To describe lessons learned from the transition to ICD-10-CM.

In most disadvantaged communities in Northern Nigeria, adolescent girls engage in economic activities so that they can save money for household items to be bought for them when they are given out for marriage. These girls right from before they reach teenage age hawk items which include ready-to-eat foods. Various socio-cultural and environmental factors reinforce vulnerability of foods to microorganisms. Food safety awareness, knowledge and practices among food vendors can be affected by interplay between individual and outdoor factors. Teenagers engage in hawking food without understanding food-related risks for the preservation of their health and the health of others. Food hygiene is the conditions and measures necessary to ensure the safety of food from production to consumption. Lack of adequate food hygiene can lead to foodborne diseases and death of the consumer. Mishandling of food can occur during food preparation, handling and storage; and studies show that consumers have inadequate knowledge about measures needed to prevent food-borne illness. There are a number of factors which are likely to contribute to outbreaks of food-borne illness in the home, including a raw food supply that may be contaminated, a lack of food safety knowledge among the general public, mistakes in food handling and preparation at home.