Improving influenza surveillance in Portuguese preschool children by parents’ report

Abstract

Influenza surveillance is usually based on nationally organized sentinel networks of physicians and on hospital reports. This study aimed to test a different report system, based on parents' phone contact to the research team and in home collection of samples by a dedicated team. The identification of influenza and other respiratory viruses Communicated by David NadalWhat is new in your paper on the basis what is already known in the field? Influenza surveillance in Europe is based mainly on nationally organized sentinel networks of physicians and on hospital reports of clinically suspected or laboratory-confirmed influenza cases. This is an efficient system for adults but probably less for young children. To our knowledge, this is the first European report showing that a surveillance system based on parents' report to a dedicated team can improve significantly the surveillance of influenza infections in young children and could complement the implanted system of the National Influenza Surveillance Program. -014-2285-7 in children who attended a Hospital Emergency Department was also recorded. Real-time PCR and reverse transcription PCR were performed for influenza A and B, parainfluenza 1-4, adenovirus, human metapneumovirus, respiratory syncytial virus A and B, rhinovirus, enterovirus, group 1 coronaviruses, group 2 coronaviruses, and human bocavirus. One hundred children were included, 64 from the day care centers and 36 from the Hospital. Overall, 79 samples were positive for at least one respiratory virus. Influenza A (H3) was the virus most frequently detected: 25 cases, 20 of these in children under 5 years of age (ten from day care centers and ten who went to the hospital) which was higher than those reported by the National Influenza Surveillance Programme for this age.Eur J Pediatr (2014) 173:1059-1065 DOI 10.1007/s00431 Conclusion:The results obtained in this study suggest that a surveillance system based on parents' reports could complement the implanted system of the National Influenza Surveillance Programme.

Respiratory infections in elderly people: Viral role in a resident population of elderly care centers in Lisbon, winter 2013–2014

“…Results of chronic respiratory diseases and quality of life from this project have already been published (Carreiro-Martins et al, 2016). The team involved was the same of a previous one that studied the health impact of indoor air environment in Children Day Care Centers (ENVIRH) (Araújo-Martins et al, 2014;Paixão et al,2014).…”

What are the characteristics of participatory surveillance systems for influenza-like-illness?

“…Participatory influenza surveillance systems were often found to be comparable [32,40] or, in a few instances, superior to existing sentinel surveillance systems [29,35] in providing advanced warning of seasonal influenza activity. However, while these systems were reported to have high sensitivity for influenza detection, their specificity may be variable depending on the syndromic definition of ILI used.…”

“…Fifteen studies analysed the utility of the participatory system and reported multiple uses, apart from collecting epidemiological data on the ILI incidence. The systems allowed access to specific populations, such as children [19,29,30], pregnant women [31], and healthcare workers [21], and access to information on healthcare-seeking behaviour [16,32,33]. Participatory systems like FluWatchers or FluTracking were used to collect information about vaccination uptake and effectiveness [16,34], while the School Health Surveillance System (SHSS) system was designed to provide data on school absenteeism [30].…”

“…A few studies discussed the systems' simplicity, mostly reporting various ways of facilitating participants' contribution, like the availability of a dedicated, free-of-charge phone line for parents [29], an easily accessible web-based portal, or applications compatible with operating systems commonly used on mobile devices [21]. The studies highlighted that intuitive software and automated maintenance of the system improved researchers' experience with the National Health Service (NHS) Direct and Mi Gripe, respectively [28,42].…”