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Pennsylvania infectious disease surveillance summary report, 2007
Thesis

Pennsylvania infectious disease surveillance summary report, 2007

Jessica Linn Mahan
Master of Public Health (M.P.H.), Drexel University
May 2009
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17918/etd-3085
pdf
Mahan_Jessica_2009848.52 kB
PDF Access upon request, Email title, URL, or DOI to archives@drexel.edu

Abstract

Pennsylvania Communicable Diseases Epidemiology Public Health
Public health surveillance is the ongoing systematic collection, analysis, and interpretation of outcome-specific health data for purposes of improving health and safety. The timely dissemination of these data to those responsible for preventing and controlling illness and injury are key to public health surveillance. An Infectious Disease Surveillance Summary Report can provide healthcare organizations and providers, government and regulatory agencies, and other concerned individuals and groups with important statistical information about potentially preventable diseases. The Pennsylvania Department of Health (PA-DOH) has not published an Infectious Disease Surveillance Summary Report since 1993. Without a published report containing epidemiologic analysis of the raw count data, the healthcare community, the general public, and state policymakers lack the important information necessary for setting public health priorities. This project consisted of secondary data analysis on several de-identified datasets provided by the PA-DOH. The data were obtained through mandatory notifiable disease reporting laws and collected via the Pennsylvania Notifiable Electronic Disease Surveillance System (PA-NEDSS). Subjects were Pennsylvania residents who incurred a reportable infectious disease for which they sought medical treatment from 2003 through 2007. A concise and comprehensive annual report was created for the PA-DOH using these datasets. This annualreport includes the 2007 case count, 2007 incidence rate, 5-year (2003-2007) average case count, and 5-year (2003-2007) average incidence rate for each of the notifiable communicable diseases in Pennsylvania. In addition, the report provides disease summaries, including descriptive epidemiology, and epidemiological trend information for selected notifiable diseases from 2003-2007. Further, the high-profile outbreak investigations that were conducted by the PA-DOH in 2007 were detailed in the report. The 2007 Pennsylvania Infectious Disease Surveillance Summary Report will serve as a convenient and accessible summary of data by providing a snapshot of the patterns of disease in the state. The report also provides an assessment of the efforts undertaken by the PA-DOH Division of Infectious Disease Epidemiology and highlights their annual accomplishments. In addition, the annual report is an important reflection of the hard work and vigilance of healthcare providers and staff at laboratories and hospitals throughout the state.

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