title: Disease surveillance based on Internet-based linear models: an Australian case study of previously unmodeled infection diseases.
abstract: Effective disease surveillance is critical to the functioning of health systems. Traditional approaches are, however, limited in their ability to deliver timely information. Internet-based surveillance systems are a promising approach that may circumvent many of the limitations of traditional health surveillance systems and provide more intelligence on cases of infection, including cases from those that do not use the healthcare system. Infectious disease surveillance systems built on Internet search metrics have been shown to produce accurate estimates of disease weeks before traditional systems and are an economically attractive approach to surveillance; they are, however, also prone to error under certain circumstances. This study sought to explore previously unmodeled diseases by investigating the link between Google Trends search metrics and Australian weekly notification data. We propose using four alternative disease modelling strategies based on linear models that studied the length of the training period used for model construction, determined the most appropriate lag for search metrics, used wavelet transformation for denoising data and enabled the identification of key search queries for each disease. Out of the twenty-four diseases assessed with Australian data, our nowcasting results highlighted promise for two diseases of international concern, Ross River virus and pneumococcal disease.
authors.affiliation: The University of Queensland Diamantina Institute, The University of Queensland, Translational Research Institute, Woolloongabba, 4102, QLD, Australia.
authors.forename: Florian
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Rohart
authors.affiliation: School of Medicine, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, 4072, QLD, Australia.|School of Public Health and Social Work, Queensland University of Technology, Kelvin Grove, 4056, QLD, Australia.
authors.forename: Gabriel J
authors.initials: GJ
authors.lastname: Milinovich
authors.affiliation: Freelance Developer, The Gap, 4061, QLD, Australia.
authors.forename: Simon M R
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Avril
authors.affiliation: The University of Queensland Diamantina Institute, The University of Queensland, Translational Research Institute, Woolloongabba, 4102, QLD, Australia.
authors.forename: Kim-Anh
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Lê Cao
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Social Work, Queensland University of Technology, Kelvin Grove, 4056, QLD, Australia.
authors.forename: Shilu
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Tong
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health and Social Work, Queensland University of Technology, Kelvin Grove, 4056, QLD, Australia.
authors.forename: Wenbiao
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Hu
mesh_terms: D001315:Australia; D003141:Communicable Diseases / Q000473:pathology*; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D016014:Linear Models; D008954:Models, Biological; D011159:Population Surveillance; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric