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ISDS 2012 Conference Abstracts

The Biosurveillance Resource Directory - A One-Stop
Shop for Systems, Sources, and Tools
Kristen Margevicius*, Mac Brown, Lauren Castro, William B. Daniel, Eric N. Generous,
Kirsten Taylor-McCabe and Alina Deshpande

Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, NM, USA

Objective
The goal of this project is to identify systems and data streams rel-

evant for infectious disease biosurveillance. This effort is part of a
larger project evaluating existing and potential data streams for use in
local, national, and international infectious disease surveillance sys-
tems with the intent of developing tools to provide decision-makers
with timely information to predict, prepare for, and mitigate the
spread of disease.

Introduction
Local, national, and global infectious disease surveillance systems

have been implemented to meet the demands of monitoring, detect-
ing, and reporting disease outbreaks and prevalence. Varying sur-
veillance goals and geographic reach have led to multiple and
disparate systems, each using unique combinations of data streams to
meet surveillance criteria. In order to assess the utility and effective-
ness of different data streams for global disease surveillance, a com-
prehensive survey of current human, animal, plant, and marine
surveillance systems and data streams was undertaken. Information
regarding surveillance systems and data streams has been (and con-
tinues to be) systematically culled from websites, peer-reviewed lit-
erature, government documents, and subject-matter expert
consultations.

Methods
A relational database has been developed and refined to allow for

detailed analyses of data streams and surveillance systems. To max-
imize the utility of the database and facilitate one-stop-shopping for
biosurveillance system information, we have expanded our scope to
include not only biosurveillance systems, but also data sources, tools,
and biosurveillance collectives. Captured in the information collected
about the resource (if available) is the name and acronym of the re-
source, the date the resource became available, the accessibility of
the resource (is it open to all, or are there limitations to access), the
primary sponsors, if the resource is associated with GIS functional-
ity, and if the focus is health. Also collected is contact information, in-
formation regarding the scope and domain of the resource, the
pertinent diseases or disease categories, and the geographic and pop-

ulation coverage of the resource. Websites associated with the re-
source are directly accessible from the database. Data stream infor-
mation is also captured based on our developed data stream
framework. If the resource uses other specified systems/sources/tools
for data gathering or analysis, then that is also captured and directly
linked within the database.

Results
The Biosurveillance Resource Directory (BRD) is in the process of

being tested by multiple potential end users in the public health,
biosecurity, and biosurveillance communities. Feedback from these
testers is being used to refine the database to maximize functionality
and utility. Additionally, methods for dynamically updating and main-
taining the database are being evaluated. Automated and semi-auto-
mated queriable reports have been developed and are integral to
demonstrating specific use-case scenarios in which the BRD would
be beneficial for end-users.

Conclusions
A need for a biosurveillance one-stop shop has been increasingly

called for to help in evaluating what data streams and systems are
available and relevant for many different biosurveillance needs and
goals. The prototype Biosurveillance Resource Directory is a search-
able, dynamic database for biosurveillance systems, sources, and
tools information.

Keywords
infectious disease; biosurveillance; database

Acknowledgments

This project is supported by the Chemical and Biological Technologies
Directorate Joint Science and Technology Office (JSTO), Defense Threat
Reduction Agency (DTRA).

*Kristen Margevicius
E-mail: kmargevicius@lanl.gov

Online Journal of Public Health Informatics * ISSN 1947-2579 * http://ojphi.org * 5(1):e138, 2013