Using ESSENCE IV

An Overview

Objectives

• Explain ESSENCE and its impact • Define surveillance• Define syndromic surveillance and its

importance• Demonstrate overview of training CD

tool

What is ESSENCE?• Electronic Surveillance System for the

Early Notification of Community-based Epidemics, ESSENCE – Johns Hopkins University

• Offers excellent “slicing and dicing” capabilities for analysis

• Delivers valuable hospital view of data for infection preventionists (IP), others

• Hospital view allows collaboration with public health while protecting hospital/patient confidentiality

• Seeks recognition and generates alerts for:– Conditions indicating unusual /

unexpected health event may be imminent

– Unusual or unexpected number of illnesses or syndromes within a period of time or geographic area

– Illness or syndromes in an unusual population

Surveillance

Purpose of Syndromic Surveillance

• Early Event Detection (primary)– Prevention measures before diagnosis of

unusual cases

• Facilitates Outbreak Management (secondary)– Case investigation and management– Exposure contact tracing– Exposure source investigation and linking of

cases and contacts to exposure sources

• This system groups acquired data into sets of symptoms that define syndromes and sub-syndromes such as :– Respiratory

• Influenza-like illness

– Gastrointestinal– Neurological

• Based on traditional sources:– Outpatient ICD-9 codes– Emergency room chief complaints

• Based on non-traditional sources:– School absenteeism– Over the counter (OTC) sales

Syndromic Surveillance:

Syndromic surveillance via limited data set:• HIPAA-compliant; gathered in software-

neutral manner• Limited data set• Algorithms run on data automatically

seeking anomalies• Historical hospital data is baseline for

analysis• Users “drill down” to investigate

Using ESSENCE IV

Who are the Target Candidates?

Support for multiple audiences:• Epidemiologists• Infection Preventionists• Clinicians

Demonstration – CD Layout

MapLayer Selection

LegendActive Layer Description

Scenario

You are an Infection Preventionist:

• Baylor Medical Center at Southwest Fort Worth

• routine check of alerts in your hospital

You are an epidemiologist:

•Receive call from infection preventionist (IP) at HCA North Hills Hospital

•High patient count with diarrhea and fever

•Lab tests reveal shigella

•Lets investigate using ESSENCE

Scenario

RESOURCES

Description of APCCredits

Disclaimer

ESSENCE provides the necessary tools…

• Useful Websites and pages:– APC main page:

www.naccho.org/topics/emergency/APC/index.cfm– Tarrant County:

www.tarrantcounty.com/eHealth/site/default.asp– Texas APC (NACCHO):

www.naccho.org/topics/demonstration/APC/TX.cfm– Texas APC*: www.texasapc.net

Helpful Resources

* Use the NACCHO link to request copies of Texas APC products. Use the contact us page at www.texasapc.net to reach session presenters, who

can also provide more complete product demos upon request.

Questions?For more information, visit: http://www.texasapc.net