Developing influenza and respiratory syncytial virus activity thresholds for syndromic surveillance in England.

Harcourt, SE, Morbey, RA, Smith, GE, Loveridge, P, Green, HK, Pebody, R, Rutter, J, Yeates, FA, Stuttard, G and Elliot, AJ ORCID: 0000-0002-6414-3065 (2019) Developing influenza and respiratory syncytial virus activity thresholds for syndromic surveillance in England. Epidemiology and Infection, 147. e163-e163.

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0950268819000542

Abstract

Influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) are common causes of respiratory tract infections and place a burden on health services each winter. Systems to describe the timing and intensity of such activity will improve the public health response and deployment of interventions to these pressures. Here we develop early warning and activity intensity thresholds for monitoring influenza and RSV using two novel data sources: general practitioner out-of-hours consultations (GP OOH) and telehealth calls (NHS 111). Moving Epidemic Method (MEM) thresholds were developed for winter 2017-2018. The NHS 111 cold/flu threshold was breached several weeks in advance of other systems. The NHS 111 RSV epidemic threshold was breached in week 41, in advance of RSV laboratory reporting. Combining the use of MEM thresholds with daily monitoring of NHS 111 and GP OOH syndromic surveillance systems provides the potential to alert to threshold breaches in real-time. An advantage of using thresholds across different health systems is the ability to capture a range of healthcare-seeking behaviour, which may reflect differences in disease severity. This study also provides a quantifiable measure of seasonal RSV activity, which contributes to our understanding of RSV activity in advance of the potential introduction of new RSV vaccines.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Influenza, moving epidemic method, respiratory syncytial virus, syndromic surveillance, thresholds
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	07 Aug 2019 08:53
Last Modified:	19 Jan 2023 00:36
DOI:	10.1017/S0950268819000542
Open Access URL:	https://doi.org/10.1017/S0950268819000542
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3051175