title: A standardized process for developing a national notifiable diseases list in a pacific island setting.
abstract: The authors describe an adapted method, originally developed for infectious disease resource allocation, for prioritizing infectious diseases for inclusion in a Pacific island nation's National Notifiable Diseases List. Using a process that was systematic, transparent, objective, and addressed multiple criteria, a panel of stakeholders judged candidate diseases against 12 objective criteria and arrived at weighted scores for the diseases, which were then ranked. The result was the successful creation of a list of 22 urgently notifiable conditions. However, the process was only incrementally more useful than the use of consensus, and certain anomalies necessitated a reality check and adjustment of the final results. The process described herein may be more useful in settings where there is wide disagreement among stakeholders; it also appears more useful for its original purpose-prioritizing public health resource allocation for infectious disease control. The modifications discussed may make it more relevant to notifiable disease selection.
authors: World Health Organization, Palikir, Federated States of Micronesia. pavlinb@wpro.who.int
authors: Boris Igor
authors: BI
authors: Pavlin
authors: Jacob L
authors: JL
authors: Kool
authors: Marcus H
authors: MH
authors: Samo
authors: Lisanne
authors: L
authors: Gerstel
mesh_terms: D003141:Communicable Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology*; D018563:Disease Notification / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D010139:Pacific Islands / Q000453:epidemiology; D011159:Population Surveillance / Q000379:methods*; D012015:Reference Standards