Release of New Issue Brief: “Syndromic Surveillance System Functionality: Recommendations from NACCHO’s Ad Hoc Biosurveillance Workgroup”

NACCHO’s Informatics Team is pleased to announce the release of a new issue brief on syndromic surveillance system functionality. Syndromic surveillance systems have been proliferating since the late 1990s. Although a framework for evaluating syndromic surveillance systems has been published, to date no documents provide guidance on the functionalities that syndromic surveillance systems should include. This document contains recommendations from NACCHO’s Ad Hoc Biosurveillance Advisory Group on essential components that a syndromic surveillance system ought to include to be considered fully functional. If you have any questions regarding this issue brief or would like more information please contact Sarah Chughtai by email at schughtai@naccho.org or by phone at 202-595-1129. SS System Functionality Brief Aug 2014

Share what works and be recognized! Apply for a 2015 Model Practice Award this October.

You and your local health department can be a winner. NACCHO will accept model practice applications Oct. 1 through Oct. 31.

NACCHO’s Model Practice Program nationally honors and recognizes outstanding local public health practice and shares the outstanding practices through the Model Practices Database. By submitting a practice, LHDs contribute to the overall improvement of public health through evidence-based best practice methods.

For more information and to submit a Model Practices application, visit www.naccho.org/topics/modelpractices. Contact the Model Practices team at practices@naccho.org with any questions. NACCHO looks forward to receiving your applications.

Discussion with the Experts: Ebola Modeling and Using Data for Public Health Practice

Please join this exciting discussion on Ebola Modeling hosted by NACCHO’s Preparedness team. The webinar will be held Wednesday, August 20th from 1-2 pm EDT. Registration information is below. We look forward to having you participate!

NACCHO will host a facilitated discussion via webinar about modeling for disease outbreaks and the utility of those results for local public health practitioners. Researchers at Virginia Tech Bioinformatics Institute have been doing modeling of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa nearly a month now, to help answer questions for the Defense Threat Reduction Agency (the part of the DoD that has developed some of the experimental treatments used on the US aid workers). Their modeling effort was designed to do a rapid estimate of future cases in Africa, potential for spread in the US, and to estimate the impact of the use of both medical countermeasures and other public health interventions.

Please join us for an online discussion with researchers from Virginia Tech. They are excited to share their research and hear your feedback. Please register for the webinar in advance at the link below!

*PRE-REGISTRATION REQUESTED USING THE LINK BELOW*

Webinar URL: http://naccho.adobeconnect.com/ebola/event/registration.html

Phone Line: 866-740-1260; Access Code: 5074193

Primary Speaker:

• Bryan Lewis, PhD, MPH

Public Health Policy & Analysis

Social & Decision Informatics Laboratory

Virginia Tech: Virginia Bioinformatics Institute