Disease Surveillance
Course description
In any public health organization, disease surveillance is a central tool for monitoring trends in diseases and evaluating programme interventions. Public health practitioners should know what makes for a functioning disease surveillance system as well as key role of the laboratory. The aim of this module is to introduce the student to all components of a surveillance system.
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Course goals
Upon completion of the instruction, the participant will be able to:
- Understand the various approaches to disease surveillance – passive surveillance, active surveillance, sentinel surveillance, laboratory based surveillance
- Define a case for the disease under surveillance
- Identify possible sources of data and decide on the most appropriate for a specific surveillance system
- Define relevant outcome indicators for monitoring the disease under surveillance, including trend monitoring and outbreak detection algorithms
- Define relevant process indicators for monitoring the quality of the surveillance system itself
- Design a form for the collection of data
- Understand the concepts of completeness and timeliness of reporting
- Understand the need for dissemination of surveillance data on a regular basis
- Know how to evaluate disease surveillance systems
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Following the course, the participant will be required to either:
- Develop a new disease surveillance system
- Evaluate an existing disease surveillance system
- Design, implement and evaluate a trend monitoring and outbreak detection application for a routine surveillance system
Target audience
Participants of this course should currently be responsible for or involved with surveillance at the provincial level.
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