Project — Connecting Real Time Data
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Syndromic surveillance serves as an early alert for health events by tracking symptoms such as respiratory distress, fever, and vomiting—before a diagnosis is confirmed. Emergency departments and other sources send this information as electronic data to public health agencies. These data are monitored daily to understand usual levels of illness and to detect changes that require a response.
CDC’s National Syndromic Surveillance Program (NSSP) helps connect local, state, and national public health agencies to data from more than 4,000 healthcare facilities in 45 states, and Washington, DC. This allows officials to unite nationwide and act quickly when something unusual happens, and to monitor how well their response is working and adjust as needed.
Learn more about the progress already being made to enhance this foundational public health surveillance program.
Michael A. Coletta, MPH
Surveillance innovations can lead to higher efficiency and faster decision-making at the local, state, and national levels.
Keywords: syndromic surveillance, surveillance workforce, electronic data
Related Links
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National Syndromic Surveillance Program (NSS)
This page is a hub for information about CDC’s National Syndromic Surveillance Program -
NSSP Resource Center
This page compiles resources for onboarding to the BioSense Platform and other important technical needs. -
Syndromic Surveillance Community of Practice PortalExternal
This web portal provides information on forums, webinars and trainings events, and encourages the sharing of ideas and success stories.
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Vital Signs: Trends in Emergency Department Visits for Suspected Opioid Overdoses —United States, July 2016-Sepctuember 2017
This March 2018 CDC Vital Signs MMWR article examines the timeliest data available to CDC on ED visits for opioid overdoses across multiple states using data from two surveillance systems.
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Syndromic Surveillance: The Value of Real-time Data for Public Health Action. Public Health Reports Volume 132, Issue 1_suppl, July/August 2017External
This compilation of 18+ articles promotes the value of syndromic surveillance under different circumstances—from all-hazards surveillance to targeted characterization of health events and surveillance of mass gatherings.
- Improving Public Health Surveillance and Data at CDC
- Modernizing Notifiable Diseases—How Counting Cases Prompts Action
- Bridging Public Health and Health Care – Better Exchange, Better Data
- Modernizing Death Reporting
- Connecting Real Time Data – When Symptoms Send a Signal
- Revolutionizing Public Health Data Systems – How Sharing Advances Surveillance
- Moving Lab Reporting at the Speed of Light
- When Informatics Promotes Innovation