Electronic Case Reporting helps stop carbon monoxide leak at a summer camp

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Manual case reporting delays a public health agency's ability to contain outbreaks, manage case investigations, or plan interventions. Since June 2020, the Tennessee Department of Health (TDH) has received essential clinical data via electronic case reporting (eCR) to improve timeliness of their public health actions. As of July 2023, TDH receives eCR data for 79 reportable conditions, including carbon monoxide poisoning.

During July 2023, healthcare facilities across Tennessee saw 31 cases of carbon monoxide poisoning. Of those cases, 90 percent were minors between the ages of 5 and 16. TDH observed a rise in carbon monoxide poisoning reports on their eCR dashboard and used syndromic surveillance data to confirm their findings. A short time later, a parent reported a carbon monoxide leak at a summer camp that exposed about 115 children to carbon monoxide. The summer camp was closed the same day, preventing further exposure and reducing risk of poisoning.

The initial eCR warning reduced TDH's time and cost burden allowing TDH to provide a timely and accurate public health response. Another advantage of eCR is its completeness. Prior to the availability of eCR data, TDH would have requested and reviewed medical records for each of the 31 cases before starting a case investigation. The eCR data contained all the necessary data elements to start case investigations, allowing TDH to bypass time-consuming medical record reviews and to quickly respond to the outbreak preventing further carbon monoxide exposure.

As of July 2024, there are 213 conditions that can be reported using eCR to public health agencies, including infectious diseases, birth defects, chronic diseases, and other non-infectious conditions. As eCR expands nationwide, public health agencies will be able to reduce response time, improve outbreak management, better monitor disease trends, and protect the nation's health more effectively.