2014.ISDS.Abstracts.Final.pdf


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ISDS 2014 Conference Abstracts

Localized Surveillance: A Fresh Perspective for Regional 
Syndromic Surveillance
Mansi Agarwal1, Nimi Idaikkadar3, José Lojo4, Kristen Soto2 and Robert Mathes*1

1Bureau of Communicable Disease, New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Long Island City, NY, USA; 
2Connecticut Department of Public Health, Hartford, CT, USA; 3Bureau of Epidemiology Services, New York City Department of 
Health and Mental Hygiene, New York, NY, USA; 4Philadelphia Dept. of Public Health, Philadelphia, PA, USA

Objective
To outline successful strategies for regional data-sharing and 

discuss how these strategies can be applied to other regions.

Introduction
Recent efforts to share syndromic surveillance data have focused 

on developing national systems, namely BioSense 2.01. The problems 
with creating and implementing national systems, such as legal issues, 
difficulties in standardizing syndrome definitions, data quality, and 
different objectives, are well documented1,2. In contrast, several 
local health departments have successfully shared data and analyses 
with each other, primarily during emergency events. The benefits 
of locally-driven data sharing include: (1) faster dissemination of 
data and analyses that have been created by those who understand 
the nuances of their own data, (2) easier process of standardizing 
syndrome definitions, (3) quickly designing appropriate analyses 
for the event, (4) smaller group of partners for consensus-building, 
and (5) ultimately improved timeliness in detection of public health 
events. The strategies used to share data and analyses between local 
and state health departments during planned and unplanned events 
may be informative to national systems.

Description
Discussion will start by highlighting a successful collaboration 

between health departments in New York City, New York State, 
New Jersey, Philadelphia, and Connecticut, including sharing of data 
through New York City’s EpiQuery website. The roundtable will then 
briefly focus on factors that make this collaboration successful.

Audience Engagement
The audience will be asked to draw on their own data-sharing 

experiences, with the following questions:
1) What are successful strategies for data sharing and why did they 

work?
2) How do successful collaborations overcome general data-

sharing challenges?
3) Can successful methods be adapted to other regions and how?
4) What is the best way to disseminate best practices in localized

data sharing across regions?
From the discussion at the roundtable, we will create a repository of 

examples and general strategies that have been successful in regional 
data sharing to share with the larger public health community.

Keywords
Data sharing; syndromic surveillance; emergencies

References

1. Rennick, Marcus, David J. Swenson, Stacey Hoferka, Charlie Ishikawa, 
and Rebecca Zwickl. “Check! Explore Barriers and Solutions to 
Data Sharing on BioSense 2.0.” Online Journal of Public Health 
Informatics 6.1 (2014).

2. Ross, Emma. “Perspectives on Data Sharing in Disease Surveillance.”
Centre on Global Health Security (2014). Chatham House.

3. Ishikawa, Charlie, comp. Syndromic Surveillance Regional Data
Sharing Workshop: HHS Region 5 Final Report. International Society 
for Disease Surveillance (2013).

*Mansi Agarwal
E-mail: magarwal@health.nyc.gov    

Online Journal of Public Health Informatics * ISSN 1947-2579 * http://ojphi.org * (1):e182, 201