Question

Give one example of how IT assists with disease monitoring and surveillance. Explain if your example is passive or active surveillance and explain why. Describe how the Center for Disease Control (CDC) is involved and why you may be in contact with them as a health IT manager

Answer 1

SURVEILLANCE AND MONITORING : The continuous, systemic collection, analysis and interpretation of health-related information needed for planning, implementing and evaluation of public healthcare services. TECHNOLOGICAL HELP IN DISEASE MONITORING AND SURVEILLANCE: A wealth of new technologies is becoming increasingly available to identify the pathogens but also for the more accurate monitoring of infectious diseases. For instance, web-based real time surveillance ( Google trends) tools and epidemic intelligence methods are intended to facilitate risk assessment and timely outbreak detection. Its main aim is to predict and prevent the future from infectious diseases threats. It is an active surveillance and is used in the United States to detect the regional outbreaks of influenza. It encompasses by alerting public healthcare practitioners during the early phases of an outbreak, enabling them to promptly institute control measures and case finding and to ensure adequate access to treatment, thereby reducing morbidity and mortality rate. CENTER FOR DISEASE CONTROL(CDC) INVOLVEMENT AND WHY IT IS NECESSARY TO CONTACT WITH IT MANAGERS: A) CDC and public health professionals can take effective and timely actions to save lives and keep Americans secure. They also have the newest technologies and methods to monitor, detect, report and respond to health threats. B) It is important to contact with health IT managers because the new technologies allow CDC to track health trends and act to save lives and protect people.