A distribution-free control charting technique based on change-point analysis for detection of epidemics.

Worldwide, the detection of epidemics has been recognized as a continuing problem of crucial importance to public health surveillance. Various approaches for detecting and quantifying epidemics of infectious diseases in the recent literature are directly influenced by methods of Statistical Process Control (SPC). However, implementing SPC quality tools directly to the general health care monitoring problem, in a similar manner as in industrial quality control, is not feasible since many assumptions such as stationarity, known asymptotic distribution etc.