ArticleViruses2022
Using an Administrative and Clinical Database to Determine the Early Spread of COVID-19 at the US Department of Veterans Affairs during the Beginning of the 2019-2020 Flu Season: A Retrospective Longitudinal Study.
Article in Viruses, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Effectiveness of early warning systems in the detection of infectious diseases outbreaks: a systematic review.BMC public health · 2022Pooled it
- Early Warning Systems for Acute Respiratory Infections: Scoping Review of Global Evidence.JMIR public health and surveillance · 2024Article
- Detecting early signals of COVID-19 outbreaks in 2020 in small areas by monitoring healthcare utilisation databases: first lessons learned from the Italian Alert_CoV project.Euro surveillance : bulletin Europeen sur les maladies transmissibles = European communicable disease bulletin · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundPrevious studies examining the early spread of COVID-19 have used influenza-like illnesses (ILIs) to determine the early spread of COVID-19. We used COVID-19 case definition to identify COVID-like symptoms (CLS) independently of other influenza-like illnesses (ILIs).
methodsUsing data from Emergency Department (ED) visits at VA Medical Centers in CA, TX, and FL, we compared weekly rates of CLS, ILIs, and non-influenza ILIs encounters during five consecutive flu seasons (2015-2020) and estimated the risk of developing each illness during the first 23 weeks of the 2019-2020 season compared to previous seasons.
resultsPatients with CLS were significantly more likely to visit the ED during the first 23 weeks of the 2019-2020 compared to prior seasons, while ED visits for influenza and non-influenza ILIs did not differ substantially. Adjusted CLS risk was significantly lower for all seasons relative to the 2019-2020 season: RR15-16 = 0.72, 0.75, 0.72; RR16-17 = 0.81, 0.77, 0.79; RR17-18 = 0.80, 0.89, 0.83; RR18-19 = 0.82, 0.96, 0.81, in CA, TX, and FL, respectively.
conclusionsThe observed increase in ED visits for CLS indicates the likely spread of COVID-19 in the US earlier than previously reported. VA data could potentially help identify emerging infectious diseases and supplement existing syndromic surveillance systems.
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