CDC awards $3.7 million to improve public health and healthcare information sharing for disease detection

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has announced $3.7 million in new grants designed to enhance healthcare information in an effort to improve the detection and response to emerging public health threats. The new grants will fund studies at three new Centers of Excellence in Public Health Informatics located at New York City Department of Health and Hygiene; the University of Utah, Salt Lake City; and Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland.

“The goal of this funding will be identifying new tools and methods to enhance health information sharing and ultimately lead to the adoption of a nationwide, technology-based, integrated healthcare surveillance system. We hope we’ll be able to detect emerging public health threats earlier and more efficiently,” said Dr. Steve Solomon, director of the Coordinating Center for Health Information and Service at CDC.

These Centers of Excellence will be designing new tools and methods to assist and enhance CDC’s BioSense program. BioSense provides real-time biosurveillance for potential health threats through immediate access to data from hospitals and healthcare systems in major metropolitan cities across the nation.

The studies will involve a variety public and private sector partners, including universities, health departments and research organizations. The principal investigator, Center, and the studies are listed below:

* Joseph Lombardo, M.S., Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Baltimore. The study will investigate new technologies which will improve the timeliness and accuracy of electronic disease surveillance systems and enhance the development of a national disease surveillance network.
* Farzad Mostashari, M.D., New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, New York. The goal of this research is to implement and evaluate a model Electronic Health Record (EHR) system that incorporates public health priorities and epidemiological data.
* Matthew Samore, M.D., University of Utah, Salt Lake City. This study seeks to enhance the use of electronic medical surveillance in detecting and investigating public health threats.

The grants are part of CDC’s Health Protection Research Initiative. The goal of the research initiative is to discover strategies and tools that increase the ability of health departments, physicians and other health care providers to promote health and prevent diseases, injuries or disabilities.

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