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TopMajor Challenges In Achieving A Biosurveillance Sysyem
US Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2010) has cited some reasons.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Biosurveillance: The integration of both well-established surveillance and investigation (e.g., reportable disease and laboratory-based surveillance) and novel surveillance practices (e.g., syndromic surveillance, open source monitoring) to achieve early detection and warning and overall situational awareness of bioterrorism events.
Bioterrorism: An event in which there exists a use, or threatened use, of biological agents to promote or spread fear or intimidation upon a specific group or the population as a whole for religious, political, ideological, financial, or personal purposes.
IT/Decision Support System (IT/DSS): A computer system designed to provide assistance in determining and evaluating alternative courses of action. IT/DSS acquires data from the mass of routine transactions of a firm/event, analyzes it with advanced statistical techniques to extract meaningful information, and narrows down the range of choices by applying rules based on decision theory.
Biothreat Agent: A biological weapon employed to deliberately cause disease in human, plants, or animal population to economic or social detriment of the nation.
Electronic Health Records (EHR): A comprehensive electronic record of a patient’s health information generated by one or more encounters in any care delivery setting. Included in this information are patient demographics, progress notes, problems, medications, vital signs, past medical history, immunizations, laboratory data and radiology reports. EHR has ability to generate a complete record of a clinical patient encounter - as well as supporting other care-related activities directly or indirectly via interface - including evidence-based decision support, quality management, and outcomes reporting.
Community of Practice (CoP): A group of people who share a passion for something that they do and who interact regularly to learn how to do it better.
Health Information Technology (HIT): A branch of IT that describes the management of health information across computerized systems and its secure exchange amongst consumers, providers, government and quality entities, and insurers to improve the overall quality, safety and efficiency of the health delivery system.
Electronic Laboratory Reporting (ELR): The electronic transmission of laboratory records from pathology laboratories to public health departments with an objective of meaningful use of data comprising reportable conditions.