NCIRD National Surveillance Materials and Resources

Morbidity

Vaccine–Preventable Disease Morbidity in the United States

A comparison of the morbidity and mortality before and after widespread implementation of national vaccine recommendations for 13 vaccine-preventable diseases for which recommendations were in place prior to 2005.

Notifiable Diseases Surveillance

National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System (NNDSS)

In cooperation with jurisdiction/state health departments, the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases (NCIRD) coordinates for 23 diseases and conditions for which data comes through NNDSS, with 20 nationally notifiable and 3 under standardized surveillance, including vaccine-preventable diseases (VPDs) and other respiratory diseases and conditions.

Surveillance Manual

Manual for the Surveillance of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases

The Manual for the Surveillance of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases provides current guidelines for those directly involved in surveillance of VPDs, especially personnel at the local and state/territorial (jurisdiction) health departments.

Surveillance Indicators

The purpose of vaccine-preventable disease surveillance indicators in the United States is to ensure adequate performance of the essential components of surveillance and case investigation, and to identify components of each that need improvement. The CDC currently monitors indicators for measles, mumps, rubella, Haemophilus influenzae, pertussis, meningococcal disease, invasive pneumococcal disease and varicella on a regular basis.

APHL/CDC Reference Centers

The Vaccine-Preventable Disease (VPD) Reference Centers are four public health laboratories that work closely with the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL) and CDC to provide quality testing free of charge to other public health laboratories and departments. The VPD Reference Centers are located in California, Minnesota, New York and Wisconsin, and provide testing for measles, mumps, rubella, varicella-zoster, B. pertussis, S. pneumoniae, N. meningitidis, and H. influenzae.

For additional information about the testing available at the VPD Reference Centers see APHL's vaccine-preventable diseases program.

Coordination and Enhancement of Surveillance

Project support is provided through the Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity for Infectious Disease (ELC) Cooperative Agreement (CoAg) to enhance vaccine-preventable and respiratory disease surveillance and coordination (ELC "Project O"). The project focuses on strengthening vaccine-preventable and respiratory disease case-based surveillance and outbreak control, building on the foundation of established surveillance systems (e.g., NNDSS) to provide broader and more representative data.

Questions about the ELC "Project O" CoAg or requests for project documents should be directed to VPDsurvELC@cdc.gov.

Data Modernization

NNDSS Modernization and the Data Modernization Initiative

NNDSS modernization activities improve CDC surveillance efforts as a component of the Data Modernization Initiative (DMI). DMI is an initiative to modernize core data and surveillance infrastructure across the federal and state public health landscape through building a foundation that supports the goal of connected and sustainable systems (e.g., technology, workforce, and partnerships).

NCIRD has developed a process to support harmonization of data elements for data collection (e.g., using message mapping guides) across the 23 diseases or conditions for which NCIRD provides subject matter expertise. NCIRD considers harmonization to include identification of overlapping and similar concepts across conditions, so that concepts are standardized and harmonized, or a decision is made to retain the concept in a unique format to meet a specific public health requirement.

OMB-PRA approval has been received for the data included in NNDSS. For details, see Federal Register OMB Package 0920-0728.

Surveillance Worksheets

Disease surveillance worksheets have been developed as standard tools to assist jurisdictions with case/outbreak reporting, investigation, and notification. These worksheets are intended as a resource to aid with collection of the surveillance data associated with the HL7 message mapping guides (MMGs). Jurisdictions may modify these worksheets as needed, to best support surveillance needs. The worksheets are not required.

Related Links and Resources

• Surveillance Trainings & Videos
• Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) – Immunization
• CSTE – Surveillance/Informatics Steering Committee
• CSTE – VPD Subcommittee

Disease-Specific Resources

• Guidance for the Evaluation and Public Health Management of Suspected Outbreak of Meningococcal Disease [4 MB, 16 pages]

• Mumps
  • CDC's Mumps site
  • Strategies for the Control and Investigation of Mumps Outbreaks
  • What Health Departments Need to Know when Responding to Mumps
  • Mumps Cases and Outbreaks