Syndromic Surveillance for Outbreak Detection and Investigation

Authors

  • Tom Andersson Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control (SMI); National Food Agency, Uppsala; Stockholm University Section for Mathematical Statistics
  • Pär Bjelkmar Inera AB, Stockholm
  • Anette Hulth Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control (SMI)
  • Johan Lindh Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control (SMI)
  • Stephan Stenmark Västerbotten County Medical Officer
  • Mikael Widerström Jämtland County Medical Officer

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5210/ojphi.v5i1.4387

Abstract

For the purpose of developing a national system of outbreak surveillance, we compared local outbreak signals in three sources of syndromic data: telephone triage of acute gastroenteritis, web queries about symptoms of gastrointestinal illness, and OTC pharmacy sales of anti-diarrhea medication. The sensitivity and specificity were highest for telephone triage data. It provided the most promising source of syndromic data for surveillance of point-source outbreaks. Currently, a project has been initialized to develop and implement a national system in Sweden for daily syndromic surveillance based on 1177 Health Care Direct, supporting regional and local outbreak detection and investigation.

Author Biography

Tom Andersson, Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control (SMI); National Food Agency, Uppsala; Stockholm University Section for Mathematical Statistics

Tom Andersson, Ph.D. in Cognitive Science and Ph.Lic. in Mathematical Statistics. Project manager of contingency planning at Swedish Institute for Communicable Disease Control (SMI) and National Food Agency (SLV), with professional and research experience of crisis management, communication and planning in public and private sectors. He has a research and teaching background in cognitive and behavioral sciences, working on warning systems and syndromic surveillance for the last two years.

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Published

2013-03-23

How to Cite

Andersson, T., Bjelkmar, P., Hulth, A., Lindh, J., Stenmark, S., & Widerström, M. (2013). Syndromic Surveillance for Outbreak Detection and Investigation. Online Journal of Public Health Informatics, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.5210/ojphi.v5i1.4387

Issue

Section

Oral Presentations: System Descriptions & Evaluations