Description of a School Nurse Visit Syndromic Surveillance System and Comparison to Emergency Department Visits, New York City.

Item request has been placed! ×
Item request cannot be made. ×
loading   Processing Request
Read Online Read More Add to Saved list
  • Additional Information
    • Subject Terms:
      ALLERGY diagnosis; ASTHMA diagnosis; DATABASE evaluation; INFLUENZA diagnosis; PUBLIC health surveillance; COMMUNITY health services; COMPARATIVE studies; STATISTICAL correlation; HOSPITAL emergency services; MIDDLE school students; SCHOOL children; SCHOOL health services; SCHOOL nursing; STATISTICS; URBAN health; PREDICTIVE validity; INTER-observer reliability; TREND analysis; RETROSPECTIVE studies; H1N1 influenza; ELECTRONIC health records; DESCRIPTIVE statistics; CHILDREN
    • Subject Terms:
      NEW York (State)
    • Abstract:
      Objectives. We compared school nurse visit syndromic surveillance system data to emergency department (ED) visit data for monitoring illness in New York City schoolchildren. Methods. School nurse visit data recorded in an electronic health record system are used to conduct daily surveillance of influenza-like illness, fever-flu, allergy, asthma, diarrhea, and vomiting syndromes. We calculated correlation coefficients to compare the percentage of syndrome visits to the school nurse and ED for children aged 5 to 14 years, from September 2006 to June 2011. Results. Trends in influenza-like illness correlated significantly (correlation coefficient = 0.89; P < .001) and 72% of school signals occurred on days that ED signaled. Trends in allergy (correlation coefficient = 0.73; P < .001) and asthma (correlation coefficient = 0.56; P < .001) also correlated and school signals overlapped with ED signals on 95% and 51% of days, respectively. Substantial daily variation in diarrhea and vomiting visits limited our ability to make comparisons. Conclusions. Compared with ED syndromic surveillance, the school nurse system identified similar trends in influenza-like illness, allergy, and asthma syndromes. Public health practitioners without school-based surveillance may be able to use age-specific analyses of ED syndromic surveillance data to monitor illness in schoolchildren. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
    • Abstract:
      Copyright of American Journal of Public Health is the property of American Public Health Association and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)