A Space-time Permutation Scan Statistic and its Application on Early Detection of Tuberculosis Outbreaks in Iran (2006-2011)

Abstract

Exact locations of patients, primary residences at the time of diagnoses are routinely collected as part of the TB surveillance program to ability clusters and detect disease outbreaks Tuberculosis early is important in order to decrease morbidity and mortality through timely implementation of disease prevention and control measures. It has been shown for syndromic surveillance data that when exact geographic coordinates of individual patients are used, higher detection rates and accuracy are achieved compared to when data are aggregated into administrative regions such as zip codes and census tracts. Many national, state, and local health departments are launching disease surveillance systems with daily analyses of hospital emergency department visits, ambulance dispatch calls, or pharmacy sales for which population-at-risk information is inaccessible or inappropriate.