Skip Navigation


Journal of Public Health Advance Access originally published online on December 7, 2006
Journal of Public Health 2007 29(1):75-82; doi:10.1093/pubmed/fdl078
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow All Versions of this Article:
29/1/75    most recent
fdl078v1
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in ISI Web of Science
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Right arrow Disclaimer
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Smith, G.
Right arrow Articles by Pringle, M.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Smith, G.
Right arrow Articles by Pringle, M.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2006, Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Faculty of Public Health. All rights reserved.

Developing a national primary care-based early warning system for health protection—a surveillance tool for the future? Analysis of routinely collected data



Gillian Smith, Regional Epidemiologist1

Julia Hippisley-Cox, Professor of Clinical Epidemiology and General Practice2

Sally Harcourt, Health Protection Scientist - Primary Care Surveillance1

Mike Heaps, Project Manager/Systems Analyst2

Mike Painter, Public Health Physician3

Alex Porter, SQL Programmer/Analyst QRESEARCH2

Mike Pringle, Professor of General Practice2
1 Health Protection Agency West Midlands, 9th Floor Ladywood House, Birmingham B2 4DY, UK
2 Centre for Population Sciences, 13th Floor Tower Building, University Park, Nottingham NG7 2RD, UK
3 Health Protection Agency Centre for Infections, 61 Colindale Avenue, London, NW9 5EQ, UK

Address correspondence to Gillian E. Smith, E-mail: gillian.smith{at}hpa.org.uk

The increasing threat of infections with pandemic potential such as influenza has focussed attention on the information needed to inform those managing a pandemic. The Health Protection Agency, Nottingham University and EMIS have developed a new national health protection surveillance system using QRESEARCH, an established primary care-derived database, to provide timely and local information on trends in community illness and prescribing. This article describes the first year of the surveillance project. Data on consultations and prescribing were extracted from routinely generated computerized consultation records between November 2004 and December 2005. Weekly consultation and prescribing rates for a range of conditions including influenza-like illness and prescription of anti-viral drugs for influenza and vomiting were developed as ‘key indicators’. These indicators were presented in a weekly bulletin showing data to strategic health authority level for use by those working in public health. The particular value of this scheme is the ability to produce timely data on illness to local level and to link prescribing to morbidity. The data were used ‘real time’ to reassure about lack of illness following the Buncefield Fuel Depot incident. This scheme is being further developed to provide daily local influenza-related information needed in an influenza pandemic.

Keywords: health protection, primary care


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer: Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.