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00/21 - FLU-ISS Sistema di sorveglianza sentinella dellinfluenza basata su medici di medicina generale e pediatri di libera scelta. Gruppo di lavoro FLU-ISS 2000, viii, 75 p.
FLU-ISS: A sentinel surveillance network for influenza relying on general practitioners and paediatricians.
Gruppo di lavoro FLU-ISS
2000, viii, 75 p. Rapporti ISTISAN 00/21 (in Italian)
In Italy, several sentinel networks for estimating the incidence of influenza have been created in recent past. However, these networks only covered certain areas of northern and central Italy and thus did not provide epidemiological data representative of the entire country. For this reason, in the winter of 1999/2000, the first nationwide sentinel surveillance network for influenza was created. The network's main objective is to provide estimates of the incidence of influenza and to identify the specific virus or viruses in circulation, also in order to prepare vaccines for the following season. The network relies on general practitioners and paediatricians and consists of two sub-networks, working on the same objectives, whose combined data cover the entire country. One sub-network is co-ordinated by the Istituto Superiore di Sanità (ISS; the Italian National Institute of Health) and the other by the Centro Interuniversitario di Ricerca sull'Influenza (CIRI; the Inter-university Research Centre on Influenza). The ISS collects data from 9 of Italy's 20 regions and from 2 autonomous provinces; data from the remaining regions are collected by the CIRI. For national-level analyses, all data are recorded in a single database and analysed as a whole; data are available on a specially created web-site. The present report describes the activities conducted to create the sub-network of the ISS, named FLU-ISS and the specific surveillance methods adopted; the epidemiological and virological results from the winter of 1999/2000 are also presented.
Key words: Influenza, Italy, Sentinel network
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