Current Projects

Epidemiology-Laboratory Integrated Reporting Pilot Project

Currently, a limited number of state health department foodborne disease epidemiologists receive daily reports from their public health laboratory, including a line-list of new reportable isolates, with associated serotype, PFGE and demographic data. Because programs with this capacity have a history of identifying and successfully investigating a high proportion of multistate foodborne disease outbreaks in the country, as well as in-state outbreaks, CIFOR wanted to design a system for developing daily combined epidemiology/laboratory reports, using a standard format which will also allow future communication and sharing of reports between jurisdictions. A domestic, open-source application was developed that combines multiple laboratory data into a single report. The application was successfully piloted in three sites and has led to a decrease in cluster detection time in at least one of the sites. The next phase of the project will incorporate epidemiologic data in order to further enhance the detection of potential foodborne disease clusters.

For more information the Epidemiology/ Laboratory Reporting Integrated Reporting Pilot Project, please contact Kirsten Larson at kirsten.larson@aphl.org.