­Chronic Disease and Data Modernization – Opportunities (and Safeguards) For Enhanced Public Health Data Collection

Overview

Renewed governmental focus on chronic disease prevention can provide a new impetus to enhance public health data collection for non-communicable diseases, building on recent progress in standardizing and modernizing infectious disease surveillance. Although public health has previously emphasized survey-based surveillance to assess chronic disease prevalence within communities, increased access to individual data in electronic health records could provide more timely and comprehensive information for responsive interventions. This resource reviews how public health authority generally supports expanding reporting requirements to encompass non-communicable diseases. However, as jurisdictions expand collection of individual data about chronic conditions, they should also ensure appropriate confidentiality safeguards in order to maintain public trust.