Early detection for cases of enterovirus- and influenza-like illness through a Newly Established School-Based Syndromic Surveillance System in Taipei, January 2010 ~ August 2011
Resource
PLoS One, 10(4),
Journal
PLoS ONE
Journal Volume
10
Journal Issue
4
Date Issued
2015
Abstract
School children may transmit pathogens with cluster cases occurring on campuses and in families. In response to the 2009 influenza A (H1N1) pandemic, Taipei City Government officials developed a School-based Infectious Disease Syndromic Surveillance System (SIDSSS). Teachers and nurses from preschools to universities in all 12 districts within Taipei are required to daily report cases of symptomatic children or sick leave requests through the SID-SSS. The pre-diagnosis at schools is submitted firstly as common pediatric disease syndrome-groups and re-submitted after confirmation by physicians. We retrieved these data from January 2010 to August 2011 for spatio-temporal analysis and evaluated the temporal trends with cases obtained from both the Emergency Department-based Syndromic Surveillance System (ED-SSS) and the Longitudinal Health Insurance Database 2005 (LHID2005). Through the SID-SSS, enterovirus-like illness (EVI) and influenza-like illness (ILI) were the two most reported syndrome groups (77.6% and 15.8% among a total of 19,334 cases, respectively). The pre-diagnosis judgments made by school teachers and nurses showed high consistency with physicians' clinical diagnoses for EVI (97.8%) and ILI (98.9%). Most importantly, the SID-SSS had better timeliness with earlier peaks of EVI and ILI than those in the ED-SSS. Furthermore, both of the syndrome groups in these two surveillance systems had the best correlation reaching 0.98 and 0.95, respectively (p<0.01). Spatio-temporal analysis observed the patterns of EVI and ILI both diffuse from the northern suburban districts to central Taipei, with ILI spreading faster. This novel system can identify early suspected cases of two important pediatric infections occurring at schools, and clusters from schools/families. It was also cost-effective (95.5% of the operation cost reduced and 59.7% processing time saved). The timely surveillance of mild EVI and ILI cases integrated with spatial analysis may help public health decision-makers with where to target for enhancing surveillance and prevention measures to minimize severe cases. ? 2015 Weng et al.
SDGs
Other Subjects
absenteeism; Article; child; cost control; cost effectiveness analysis; disease surveillance; disease transmission; early diagnosis; Enterovirus infection; female; flu like syndrome; geographic distribution; health care cost; human; major clinical study; male; nurse; public health; school health service; spatiotemporal analysis; Taiwan; teacher; trend study; cost benefit analysis; diarrhea; Disease Outbreaks; economics; Enterovirus; Enterovirus Infections; geography; health survey; host pathogen interaction; incidence; Influenza A virus (H1N1); Influenza, Human; physiology; procedures; school; season; statistics and numerical data; syndrome; university; virology; Enterovirus; Cost-Benefit Analysis; Diarrhea; Disease Outbreaks; Early Diagnosis; Enterovirus; Enterovirus Infections; Faculty; Geography; Host-Pathogen Interactions; Humans; Incidence; Influenza A Virus, H1N1 Subtype; Influenza, Human; Nurses; Population Surveillance; Schools; Seasons; Spatio-Temporal Analysis; Syndrome; Taiwan; Universities
Type
journal article