Enhanced Influenza Surveillance using Telephone Triage Data in the VA ESSENCE Biosurveillance System

Authors

  • Cynthia A. Lucero-Obusan Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Public Health
  • Carla A. Winston Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Public Health
  • Patricia L. Schirmer Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Public Health
  • Gina Oda Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Public Health
  • Anoshiravan Mostaghimi Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Public Health
  • Mark Holodniy Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Public Health; Division of Infectious Diseases & Geographic Medicine, Stanford University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5210/ojphi.v5i1.4389

Abstract

Telephone triage (TT) is a potential data source for biosurveillance. An analysis of Veterans Affairs (VA) TT and visit data for influenza and influenza-like-illness (ILI) was performed for 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 seasons. There were 7,044 influenza-coded calls, 564 hospitalizations, 1,849 emergency/urgent visits, and 416,613 ILI-coded outpatient visits. Spearman correlation coefficients were calculated for influenza-coded calls with hospitalizations (0.77); emergency/urgent visits (0.85); and ILI-outpatient visits (0.88), respectively. For 2011-2012, TT alerted increased influenza activity before other settings. Peak activity was similar across settings for both seasons. TT correlates well with VA healthcare utilization and may provide earlier alerts of influenza activity.

Author Biography

Cynthia A. Lucero-Obusan, Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Public Health

Dr. Lucero-Obusan is a medical epidemiologist with the VHA Office of Public Health. Her work and interests include biosurveillance, healthcare-associated infections, infection control and outbreak investigation, influenza, emerging infections and geographic information systems (GIS). Dr. Lucero-Obusan is a graduate of UC Berkeley and the University of North Carolina School of Medicine. She also currently serves as a Hospital Epidemiologist for the VA Palo Alto Healthcare System.

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Published

2013-03-23

How to Cite

Lucero-Obusan, C. A., Winston, C. A., Schirmer, P. L., Oda, G., Mostaghimi, A., & Holodniy, M. (2013). Enhanced Influenza Surveillance using Telephone Triage Data in the VA ESSENCE Biosurveillance System. Online Journal of Public Health Informatics, 5(1). https://doi.org/10.5210/ojphi.v5i1.4389

Issue

Section

Poster Presentations