Sentinel laboratory surveillance of hepatitis C antibody testing in England: understanding the epidemiology of HCV infection.

This paper describes sentinel laboratory surveillance of hepatitis C antibody testing in England. Demographic and test result data were supplemented by follow-up questionnaires sent to the requesting clinician. Between October 2002 and September 2003 almost 75000 anti-HCV tests were performed in eight sentinel centres.

The effect of deprivation, age and sex on NHS Direct call rates.

Background: The use of primary care services in the UK is traditionally high in deprived areas. There has been little research into the effect of deprivation on the uptake of NHS Direct, a national nurse-led health helpline.

Aim: To explore the impact of deprivation, age and sex on call rates to two NHS Direct sites.

National symptom surveillance using calls to a telephone health advice service--United Kingdom, December 2001-February 2003.

Introduction: Recent terrorist activity has highlighted the need to improve surveillance systems for the early detection of chemical or biologic attacks. A new national surveillance system in the United Kingdom (UK) examines symptoms reported to NHS Direct, a telephone health advice service.

Objectives: The aim of the surveillance system is to identify an increase in symptoms indicative of early stages of illness caused either by a deliberate release of a biologic or chemical agent or by common infections.

Early warning and NHS Direct: a role in community surveillance?

Background: NHS Direct is a nurse-led telephone help line that covers the whole of England and Wales. NHS Direct derived data are being used for community surveillance, the purpose of which is to detect a local or national increase in symptoms reported by callers. The system has the potential to identify an increase in symptoms reported by callers about people in the prodromal stages of illness caused by the deliberate release of a biological or chemical agent.

What can analysis of calls to NHS direct tell us about the epidemiology of gastrointestinal infections in the community?

Objectives: Most gastrointestinal (GI) illness within the UK goes undetected by routine surveillance. A national telephone helpline for health advice (NHS Direct) offers a new source of data on GI infection. We aim to describe NHS Direct calls suggestive of GI infection and the outcome of these calls.