title: Enhancing surveillance for hepatitis C through public health informatics.
abstract: Disease surveillance for hepatitis C in the United States is limited by the occult nature of many of these infections, the large volume of cases, and limited public health resources. Through a series of discrete processes, the Massachusetts Department of Public Health modified its surveillance system in an attempt to improve timeliness and completeness of reporting and case follow-up of hepatitis C. These processes included clinician-based reporting, electronic laboratory reporting, deployment of a Web-based disease surveillance system, automated triage of pertinent data, and automated character recognition software for case-report processing. These changes have resulted in an increase in the timeliness of reporting.
authors.affiliation: Massachusetts Department of Public Health, Bureau of Infectious Disease Prevention, Response and Services, William A. Hinton State Laboratory Institute, 305 South St., Jamaica Plain, MA 02130, USA. dawn.heisey@state.ma.us
authors.forename: Dawn M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Heisey-Grove
authors.forename: Daniel R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Church
authors.forename: Gillian A
authors.initials: GA
authors.lastname: Haney
authors.forename: Alfred
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Demaria
mesh_terms: D057205:Automation, Laboratory; D016358:Contact Tracing / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D016208:Databases, Factual; D018563:Disease Notification / Q000379:methods* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D001330:Electronic Data Processing; D005568:Forms and Records Control; D006526:Hepatitis C / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology*; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet / Q000458:organization & administration*; D008404:Massachusetts / Q000453:epidemiology; D008498:Medical Record Linkage; D011159:Population Surveillance / Q000379:methods*; D016730:Program Development; D015397:Program Evaluation; D011635:Public Health Administration / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D040442:Public Health Informatics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D018511:Systems Integration; D013997:Time Factors; D014218:Triage / Q000458:organization & administration