 Exists to serve the community’s interests by providing social conditions in which people maintain health  Describes epidemics and the spread of disease, protects against environmental hazards, promotes health, responds to disaster, provides recovery, and access to health care

 Assessment and monitoring of community health and populations at risk to identify health problems and priorities  Formation of public policies to solve identified health problems and priorities  Ensure that population gain access to cost- effective care, health promotion and disease prevention services  Evaluation of care effectiveness

 Preparedness  Data availability, databases and resources  electronic health and medical records  Comparative effectiveness of interventions  Data privacy  Data accuracy and security  New information systems and technologies

 Systematic application of information through computer science and technology to public health practice, research, and learning and solve important public health problems and processes  Technology facilitates the availability of timely, relevant, and high quality information thus providing advice on methods for achieving a public health goal faster, better, or at a lower cost

 Study and description of complex systems  Identification of opportunities to improve the efficiency, and effectiveness of public health systems through innovative data collection or use of information  Implementation and maintenance of processes and systems to achieve such improvements

 PHI provides insights and opportunities to improve the ff:  Planning and system design  Data collection  Data management and collation  Analysis  Interpretation  Dissemination  Application to public health programs

 Threat and risk are potentially harmful events in the environment o Threat -harmful act o Risk -expectation of a threat that may succeed and potential damage that can occur  Estimates current and future exposures and its health risks to the population  Risk assessment tools have been developed and utilized to identify such events

 SPRC – Suicide Prevention Community Assessment Tool  YRBSS – Youth Risk Behaviour Surveillance System  BRFSS – Behavioural Risk Factor Surveillance System  NHANES – National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey

1. Hazard identification – determine potential hazardous material and health problems it may cause 2. Exposure assessment – assess length, amount, and pattern of exposure to hazardous material

3. Dose-response assessment – estimate amount of exposure to hazardous material that may cause negative health effects 4. Risk characterization – “How much risk is acceptable?”

 Informatics and new technology provide disease surveillance  Disease surveillance utilizes health-related data that signify the probability of a case or outbreak warranting further public health response  Information is vital to public health programming.

 Administrative, financial, and facility sources provide data for processing into public health information  Vital statistics data are also used for public health purposes

 Timely detection of potential health threats  Situational awareness  Surveillance  Outbreak management  Countermeasure  Response  Communications

 Ongoing, systematic collection, analysis and interpretation of health data; essential to the planning and closely integrated with the dissemination of these data to those who need to know; linked prevention and control  Made possible through advances in information sciences and technology, changes in methodology, data availability, data synthesis, and expanded health information needs  IT enable better data compilation, analysis, dissemination

 To address a defined public health problem or question  Use the data to guide efforts that will protect and promote population health surveillance as an ongoing and systematic implementation  New communication and IT have potential to enhance surveillance and health promotion

 Adopted new methods of health inquiry using innovative data sources, methods of data collection and analysis to adapt to the health information needs and advancement of public health surveillance in the 21 st century

 Ongoing systematic collection of health data  Reporting frequency – delayed reporting might limit usefulness of the data and weaken the link to prevention and control activities  Rapid reporting – essential for detection and prevention of high-hazard events  Applying information to a defined public health problem and its use to guide strategies that protect and promote population health  Link to prevention and control – innovative to meet the needs of decision makers and drive prevention and control programs in the future

 Early detection of possible outbreaks through investigations of potential infectious cases  Achieved through timely and complete review of disease case reports

 Surveys can provide sufficient information for making public health decision and detecting trends  Involves gathering of significant data and timely information:  Absences from work or school  Increased purchase of health-care products  Presenting symptoms to health-care providers  Laboratory tests

 Epidemic Information Exchange – secure communication system to access and share health surveillance information  Health Alert Network – state and nationwide alert system  Biosense – improved real-time biosurveillance and situational awareness for early detection  Public Health Information Network – standards and software solutions for rapid flow of public health information

 Data availability and exchange pose a significant impact on public health functions (disease monitoring and syndromic surveillance)  Public health informatics provides real-time surveillance data  Investigation and emergences managed electronically with informatics tools

 Achievable and less costly health data collection, analysis and distribution  Two-way communication between public and private health agencies help identify clusters of reportable and unusual diseases  PH information systems involve partnership of federal, state and local public health professionals

 PHI provides dissemination of prevention guidelines and communication among PH officials, clinicians, and patients  IT solutions provide accurate and timely information to guide public health actions

 Community and population health improvement depends on effective public and health care infrastructures  Population health data is one of the important infrastructures to facilitate health information exchanges regionally and nationally

 Regional and national health information networks provide broader participation in surveillance and prevention activities, case management, care coordination; increased accuracy and timeliness of information for disease reporting

 PHI ensures that health data systems meet the needs of all organizations involved in population health  Healthcare data collection standards are developed covering environmental, socio- cultural, economic data relevant to population health

 Mobile phone –penetrated poor and peripheral populations  Internet-increase in scope and capacity  Handheld computing devices with GPS-can conduct health survey with improved accuracy, sampling and supervision; timeliness of analysis and reporting

Frieden, T.R. (2012, July 27). CDC’s vision for public health surveillance in the 21 st century. Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. Atlanta, G.A.: Office of Surveillance, CDC. Kraft, M.R. & Androwich, I. (2010). Using informatics to promote community/population health. Georgia: Jones and Barrlett Publishers.