No description available.

No description available.

Background: Early and accurate diagnosis of influenza helps start correct treatment and prevention strategies at individual level. Ongoing systematic collection, analysis and dissemination of the surveillance data from aggregated diagnostic results and other early indicators help gather the foremost disease information for all subsequent control and mitigation strategies in the community. Disease information from surveillance results then feed back to medical practitioners for improving diagnosis. By improving this loop of disease information transfer in terms of accuracy and timeliness, interventions for disease control can be applied efficiently and effectively. Methods: Several new influenza diagnosis and surveillance methods were explored and evaluated by comparing with laboratory reference test results. Logistic regression models were applied to synthesize a refined clinical guideline for human influenza infections. The performance of QuickVue rapid diagnostic test was evaluated in a community setting. Weekly positive rates from the above two diagnostic methods, together with three other different syndromic surveillance systems, including data from school absenteeism, active telephone survey and internet based survey were evaluated according to the US CDC public health surveillance systems guideline in terms of their utility, correlations and aberration detection performance. Different combinations of surveillance data streams and aberration detection algorithms were evaluated to delineate the optimal use of multi-stream influenza surveillance data. A framework of efficient surveillance data dissemination was synthesized by incorporating the merits of the online national surveillance websites and the principles of efficient data presentation and dashboard design. Results: A refined clinical diagnostic rule for influenza infection using fever, cough runny nose and clinic visit during high influenza activity months as predictors was scored the highest amount all other current clinical definitions. Time series weekly positive rate from this rule showed better correlation with reference community influenza activity than many other current clinical influenza definitions. The QuickVue rapid diagnostic test has an overall diagnostic sensitivity of 68% and specificity 96%, with an analytic sensitivity threshold of 105 to106 viral copies per ml. Weekly aggregated QuickVue and school absenteeism surveillance data was found to be highly correlated with hospital laboratory and community sentinel surveillance data, but the telephone and internet survey was only moderately correlated. Multiple univariate methods performed slightly better than multivariate methods for aberration detections in general. More sophisticated outbreak detection algorithms did not result in significant improvement of outbreak detection / published_or_final_version / Community Medicine / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1964. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Bibliography: l. 71-76.

Thesis (M.S.)--Ohio State University. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 59-60). Available online via OhioLINK's ETD Center.

Thesis (M. Soc. Sc.)--University of Hong Kong, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 52-59).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1963. / Typescript. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 84-92).

Bibliography: leaves 439-535. / This is the first serious study of the worst natural disaster in South African' history and of the impact of this disaster on the country and its people. utilising both published and unpublished official and unofficial sources, newspapers, periodicals and the recollections of over 200 'flu survivors, it traces the course of the epidemic in five main areas where its severity paralysed everyday life, viz. the Witwatersrand gold mines, Cape Town, Kimberley, Bloemfontein and the Transkei. Each of these five chapters concludes with an examination of the results which the epidemic produced locally, in spheres such as housing, sanitation, welfare schemes, the provision of medical facilities and racial segregation. Part 2 of the study surveys the makeshift efforts of the small sub-department of Public Health to combat the epidemic and makes clear how its inadequate performance brought about wide-scale agreement as to the urgent need for the creation of a fully-fledged Ministry of Public Health. Part 3 focusses on fundamental medical and aetiological issues which the epidemic raised and discusses the range of answers offered by contemporaries to questions relating to the identity, treatment and cause of the Spanish 'flu. Both medical and lay opinion on these matters are investigated and it is suggested that in 1918 most South Africans found 'scientific' answers to these questions foreign to their thinking. The attempts of the lay public to explain why the disaster occurred provide sharp insights into the prevailing world-view of much of the population. Part 4 concentrates on the results of the epidemic at a national level, both in the short and in the long term. Chapter 9 deals with its demographic impact and concludes that the Spanish 'flu epidemic was the single most important episode in South Africa's demographic history. Chapters 10 and 11 examine its more creative results - from the provision of facilities for the thousands of 'flu orphans and the rush for life insurance to the passing of the Public Health Act of 1919 and the establishment of an autonomous Ministry of Public Health. Less obvious consequences are noted too: Central Government recognition of the importance of the social welfare of (White) citizens and an enhanced anxiety about the dangers of infection across racial and class barriers and the measures taken to reduce this threat. The Conclusion argues that the Spanish 'flu epidemic was a landmark in South African social, medical and administrative history. Coming at a time when features of the new state were still being moulded, the epidemic impressed its mark on, the country in a number of fundamental ways. In addition, a study of the episode highlights aspects of contemporary South African life and thought usually hidden from the historian. The glimpses which it affords of prevailing attitudes, anxieties and assumptions at a popular level in 1918 are invaluable. Finally, the Conclusion considers why the devastating 'flu epidemic has been ignored by historians and forgotten by the majority of the people of South Africa.

Thesis (M. P. H.)--University of Hong Kong, 2006. / Also available in print.

Thesis (M. P. H.)--University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 55-58) Also available in print.