Public health surveillance of hepatitis C: can it identify incident cases?
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate a follow-up system to identify incident cases among individuals notified with the hepatitis C virus (HCV).


METHODS
A cross-sectional survey of medical practitioners treating individuals notified to the NSW Health Department as having HCV between August 1996 and August 1997 was conducted.


RESULTS
Five hundred and fifty-four new notifications were received during the study period (70.7 per 100,000 people). Ninety-six per cent of notifications were followed up with 54 individuals (9.7%) identified as incident cases. Incident cases were significantly younger than prevalent cases (median age 30 vs. 39, p < 0.001) with drug and alcohol notifications being more likely to be incident cases.


CONCLUSIONS
HCV transmission is continuing at relatively high levels with incident cases being significantly younger than prevalent cases.


CONCLUSIONS
An efficient notification follow-up strategy that identifies incident cases could be routinely used to assess the effectiveness of population-based initiatives aimed at reducing HCV transmission.
Staff
M P
MP
Northern Sydney Area Public Health Unit, Hornsby Hospital, NSW. MSTAF@doh.health.nsw.gov.au
Brnabic
A J
AJ
Schwarz
J
J
Holt
D A
DA
D000328:Adult; D017677:Age Distribution; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D016208:Databases, Factual; D018563:Disease Notification / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D005260:Female; D006526:Hepatitis C / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000517:prevention & control* / Q000635:transmission; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D009517:New South Wales / Q000453:epidemiology; D011159:Population Surveillance / Q000379:methods*; D015995:Prevalence; D015397:Program Evaluation; D012042:Registries; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D014504:Urban Health / Q000706:statistics & numerical data