Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Public Health and Surveillance
Date Submitted: Apr 12, 2024
Open Peer Review Period: Jun 28, 2024 - Aug 28, 2024
Date Accepted: Jun 13, 2024
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
Evaluation of the hand, foot, and mouth disease sentinel surveillance system in South Korea: CDC’s surveillance evaluation method
ABSTRACT
Background:
As a transition period from the COVID-19 pandemic, evaluating existing surveillance systems for effective use of limited public health resources is needed. This study aimed to evaluate the performance of a hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) surveillance program in South Korea during 2017-2022.
Objective:
This study aimed to evaluate HFMD surveillance system in South Korea during 2017-2022, specifically focusing on the transition period after the COVID-19 pandemic.
Methods:
We retrospectively reviewed the HFMD sentinel surveillance system from the Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency using structured guidelines for evaluating public health system published by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. We assessed HFMD surveillance system performance for five attributes: timeliness, stability, data completeness, sensitivity, and representativeness with scoring weak, moderate, and good performance.
Results:
Our study findings showed that the completeness and sensitivity of the HFMD surveillance performance had reduced to moderate and weak during the COVID-19 pandemic between 2020-2021 and returned to good in 2022, while the timeliness and representativeness were good during the overall study period.
Conclusions:
The sensitivity and completeness of HFMD surveillance performance were reduced during the COVID-19 pandemic. Continuous surveillance evaluation with improving the reduced attributes of infectious diseases is required to provide robust data for the public and policymakers. Furthermore, a more comprehensive study is warranted to identify other surveillance system attributes, such as simplicity and acceptability.
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Copyright
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