title: A population health surveillance theory.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Despite its extensive use, the term "Surveillance" often takes on various meanings in the scientific literature pertinent to public health and animal health. A critical appraisal of this literature also reveals ambiguities relating to the scope and necessary structural components underpinning the surveillance process. The authors hypothesized that these inconsistencies translate to real or perceived deficiencies in the conceptual framework of population health surveillance. This paper presents a population health surveillance theory framed upon an explicit conceptual system relative to health surveillance performed in human and animal populations.
  
  
  METHODS
  The population health surveillance theory reflects the authors' system of thinking and was based on a creative process.
  
  
  RESULTS
  POPULATION HEALTH SURVEILLANCE INCLUDES TWO BROAD COMPONENTS: one relating to the human organization (which includes expertise and the administrative program), and one relating to the system per se (which includes elements of design and method) and which can be viewed as a process. The population health surveillance process is made of five sequential interrelated steps: 1) a trigger or need, 2) problem formulation, 3) surveillance planning, 4) surveillance implementation, and 5) information communication and audit.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The population health surveillance theory provides a systematic way of understanding, organizing and evaluating the population health surveillance process.
authors.affiliation: Groupe de Recherche en Épidémiologie des Zoonoses et Santé Publique (GREZOSP), Université de Montréal, Quebec, Canada.
authors.forename: Farouk
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: El Allaki
authors.forename: Michel
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Bigras-Poulin
authors.forename: Pascal
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Michel
authors.forename: André
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ravel