Group items tagged

The mission of the National Syndromic Surveillance Program (NSSP) is to promote the use of high quality syndromic surveillance data for improved nation-wide all-hazard situational awareness for public health decision-making and enhanced responses to hazardous events, and outbreaks. The purpose of this funding opportunity is to assist state and local public health authorities to implement syndromic surveillance to enhance situation awareness and detect and characterize disease outbreaks or other hazardous events or conditions of public health concern in order to respond quickly to local threats. In addition, this program provides support to state and local health authorities to advance the Meaningful Use of syndromic surveillance data from electronic health records (EHR). Activities that will be supported to enhance syndromic surveillance capacity and practice include (1) improving the overall representativeness of syndromic surveillance data by recruiting hospital or other sources of emergency department/urgent care or inpatient data that are representative of the jurisdiction’s population; (2) improving the quality, timeliness, utility, and sharing of these data; and (3) increasing collaboration among state and local jurisdictions through a National Syndromic Surveillance Community of Practice.

The purpose of this FOA is to enhance the capacity of surveillance programs to implement or enhance a population-based, multiple-source surveillance program for autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and other developmental disabilities (DDs) that co-occur with ASD (cerebral palsy (CP) and intellectual disability (ID)). The project will fund sites to participate in the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network and will enhance surveillance activities at both prior and newly participating sites through two funding components. Component A funds surveillance of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and other DDs (i.e. CP and ID) among 8-year-olds. Component B funds surveillance of ASD among 4-year-olds. Component A is required for all applicants, while applying for Component B funding is optional. In this FOA, five project period short-term outcomes will be achieved through five strategies and their corresponding activities. The five expected outcomes include: improved understanding of ASD & other DDs, including trends and disparities in ASD prevalence over time; improved understanding of the implications of the change from DSM-IV TR to DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for ASD; stronger relationships with partners and data sources; increased dissemination of ADDM data; improved reliability and efficiency of ADDM surveillance.

During the last nine years, the U.S. Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has worked with nations around the world to build capacity to prepare, detect, and respond to pandemics. Through previous funding opportunity announcements (FOA) and subsequent cooperative agreements, CDC and its international partners and national ministries of health focused on three pillars: 1) preparedness and communication; 2) surveillance and detection; 3) response and containment. The success of this developed capacity is evident across the globe. Through these cooperative agreements, CDC and partners have: Developed national government public-health pandemic preparedness plans Developed pandemic communication plans Improved laboratory capacity and infrastructure for influenza virologic surveillance Enhanced epidemiology capacity and infrastructure for disease surveillance Developed sentinel, hospital-based surveillance for severe acute respiratory illness (SARI) Enhanced integration of laboratory and epidemiologic surveillance for influenza Developed surveillance for cases and clusters of respiratory and febrile illnesses that could represent emerging new pandemics. Trained local rapid-response and containment teams. Developed infection control guidelines in public health-care settings for the prevention of avian and pandemic flu. It is critical that these new capacities be sustained and strengthened over time to ensure global capacity to detect and respond to pandemic influenza effectively.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) supports a variety of activities in health departments and organizations aimed at preventing and controlling cancer, the second leading cause of death in US men and women. Since the passage of the Cancer Registries Amendment Act in 1992, the National Program of Cancer Registries (NPCR) has collected data on cancer occurrence, extent, treatment and outcomes in over 45 states and jurisdictions, representing 96% of the US population. CDC's Division of Cancer Prevention and Control (DCPC) has supported successful partnerships with national organizations to define standardized practices in U.S. cancer surveillance and assure and complete, timely, and high-quality data for the official federal U.S. Cancer Statistics. The purpose of this funding opportunity is to build strong partnerships among national organizations involved directly in cancer surveillance in order to enhance the data quality and operational efficiency of CDC’s National Program of Cancer Registries (NPCR). This program has three essential components: 1) Education, Translation and Quality Control of cancer surveillance standards and best practices; 2) Cancer Staging Collaboration and Support; and 3) Standardization and Support for Laboratory and Biomarker Electronic Reporting. The overarching goal of this project is to collaboratively define and promote uniform standards in cancer staging, collection and reporting. Funded entities will identify specific enhancement needs of cancer registries and support cancer surveillance professionals, including reporters (e.g. facilities, labs), tumor registrars, and registries to submit high quality, standardized data via central cancer registries to NPCR. Relevant performance measures will be used to assess the recipients’ activities that enhance the standards, quality, and operations of NPCR cancer surveillance system.

The purpose of this funding opportunity announcement (FOA) is to strengthen HIV strategic information (SI) in Senegal through design and implementation of a national HIV case reporting system and other surveillance activities in support of the national Strategic Information (SI) program. This announcement allows for the expansion of existing HIV surveillance activities in Senegal with the following program goals and objectives: * Implementing a round of surveillance among pregnant women attending ANC based on routine prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT) program data by 2016 through the evaluating and strengthening the quality of routine PMTCT data and HIV testing. * Supporting the Senegal National AIDS Control Program (CNLS) to establishing a national HIV case surveillance system by 2019 through the strengthening and expansion of the pilot case surveillance system initiated in 2013.

NIOSH uses cooperative agreements to arrange collaborative surveillance and research opportunities with state health departments, universities, labor unions, and nonprofit organizations. NIOSH funds a broad array of cooperative agreements to develop knowledge for preventing occupational diseases, injury, and death. The U24 cooperative agreement mechanism will be used to provide tribal nations, states, and large municipalities with technical assistance and services to build occupational safety and health (OSH) program capacity and promote the use of multiple-source surveillance data. The awardee(s) will advance education and translation through the operation of an open-access online repository for occupational health information and surveillance data. States, Non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and tribes will draw upon relationships with their stakeholders to use surveillance data to take action such as identify or support tribal and state priorities, and guide coordinated, targeted efforts to protect workers; monitor statistical and other trends and progress over time (i.e., burden and impact); propose pilot and evaluation activities for addressing disease burden or impact; conduct educational and outreach activities; and to develop prevention and intervention recommendations.

The purpose of this NOFO is to enhance the capacity of surveillance programs to implement a population-based, multiple source surveillance program for autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The project will fund sites to participate in the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Monitoring (ADDM) Network and will enhance surveillance activities at both prior and newly participating sites through two funding components. Component A is required for all applicants, while applying for Component B funding is optional. Component A funds surveillance of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) among 4-year-old and 8-year-old children. Component A activities include: adhere to standardized ADDM Network methodology; renew or establish agreements for access to BOTH health and education data sources (electronic and paper records); staff training and continued education; report clean, de-identified data with vital records/census linkages to CDC; submit at least two manuscripts; engage partners and stakeholders in activities aimed at increasing use of ADDM data; and create and implement a strategic plan for performance monitoring and evaluation. Component B funds conducting follow-up at age 16 years of children abstracted for ASD at age 8 years in 2010 and 2012, including collecting data on characteristics, functioning, and educational service delivery (including transition planning). These data will inform public health strategies to improve identification and services for children with ASD.

Through this NOFO, CDC plans to fund up to seven recipients for a one-year period of performance to participate in a rigorous course of activities to build capacity for a state-wide SCD surveillance system. CDC plans to fund up to five recipients to engage stakeholders, participate in web-based learning sessions, assess database linkages and infrastructure, and report out on all required capacity building SCD surveillance activities (Component A). CDC also plans to fund up to two recipients to provide technical assistance (Component B). The technical assistance will be provided through a series of web-based learning sessions, in-person meetings, in-state and cross-state relationship building, and ongoing communications to create the partnerships, data sharing agreements, and data storage system needed to successfully implement an SCD surveillance system. Applicants can apply for only Component A or Component B. This NOFO will improve and expand the current SCDC efforts by building the capacity of additional states to implement the program. Each state has a unique demographic makeup, distinct health care policies, and challenges related to access to care; all of these factors play a large role in the outcomes and experiences of individuals with SCD. By building capacity for additional states to implement SCDC, this NOFO builds the framework and a road map for recipients to gather unique data and conduct in-depth analyses to inform their SCD efforts and to compare and contrast SCD-related health care and health outcomes across states. Furthermore, the framework should have future utility for other parties interested in expanding their SCD surveillance.

The United States (U.S.) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is working to help the Côte d'Ivoire Ministry of Health meet key International Health Regulation (IHR) requirements through implementation of priority Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) activities. The objectives of this program are to strengthen Côte d'Ivoire's health system capacities to prevent, detect and respond to infectious disease outbreaks and other public health emergencies. This program emphasizes further improving core GHSA priority capacities in disease surveillance, laboratory diagnostics, emergency preparedness and response, public health workforce development, and strengthening of anti-microbial resistance stewardship. This program includes a particular focus on strengthening disease surveillance through the establishment of an event-based surveillance system in high-risk border districts, reinforced through public health staff training and supervision. Surveillance and response capacities will be bolstered through improved laboratory point of care diagnostics and the integration of epidemiologic and laboratory data. This program will also support building Côte d'Ivoire's capacity to respond to disease outbreaks and public health emergencies through the training and mentoring of a cadre of public health workers in each of the 101 districts in Côte d'Ivoire in field epidemiology and emergency preparedness and response, reinforcing these capacities via field simulation exercises.

The purpose of this Notice of Funding Opportunity Announcement (NOFO) is to conduct surveillance to assess the incidence and prevalence of diabetes among children, adolescents and young adults in the United States and provide estimates by diabetes type, age, sex, race/ethnicity and geographic area. This NOFO has three (3) components to achieve the purpose of the program * Component A focuses on surveillance of incidence and prevalence of diabetes among children and adolescents (<45 years). * Component C serves as a Coordinating Center to provide an infrastructure for standardized approaches, analytical methods, and surveillance measures. It also serves as a repository for the Component A and B data and provides consolidated estimates by diabetes type, age, race/ethnicity and geographic area.

Botswana has both a high prevalence of HIV (25% among persons 15-49 years of age) and a high incidence of TB (455 new cases per 100,000 population per year). Drug resistance is a concern with both diseases. High quality surveillance and monitoring data are needed for effective disease control efforts. This funding opportunity announcement (FOA) has two primary objectives. Both are meant to support ongoing efforts of the Botswana Ministry of Health (MOH). The first objective is to strengthen the capacity of the TB laboratory and surveillance systems focusing on drug resistance and system integration. The second objective is to a) complete the national rollout of PIMS II (Patient Information Management System) to health care facilities and development of the national data warehouse and b) to support development and implementation of an HIV surveillance strategy at national- and district-levels.

The purpose of this Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) is to expand the vision and eye health surveillance system by identifying and incorporating new data sources and validating data and key indicators, maintaining the existing system, and promoting the vision and eye health surveillance system to stakeholders to monitor the burden of vision loss and eye diseases and ultimately to improve the vision and eye health of the nation. Vision loss is recognized as a public health problem because it affects more than 4 million people aged 40 years and older in the United States. It is associated with higher prevalence of multiple chronic conditions such as diabetes, cardiovascular health, falls, injuries, depression, smoking, premature mortality and overall poorer quality of life. The United States government in Healthy People 2010 and 2020, in conjunction with the vision and eye care communities, have identified the reduction of population disparities in vision loss and access to eye care services as top public health priorities. Despite the knowledge about the individual and societal burden of vision loss and eye diseases, the public health surveillance system in the United States has only just begun to systematically understand and monitor the magnitude and implications of vision loss, access to eye care, and effectiveness of services that potentially improve health and quality of life of those who are at risk of or experience vision loss.

The purpose of this NOFO is to provide funding and technical assistance for PEPFAR countries to establish HIV recent infection surveillance to detect recent infections, monitor trends in the HIV epidemic, identify hot spots associated with recent HIV transmission, and inform programmatic interventions to reach epidemic control. Point-of-care tests for recent infection distinguish between recent (HIV seroconversion in the last 6 months, on average) and non-recent HIV infection and provide results within minutes. These data may be linked to HIV case-based surveillance for ongoing epidemic monitoring and used by programs to provide enhanced counselling for immediate ART initiation, prioritize index testing, and intervene to prevent HIV transmission. This NOFO will require a multi-disciplinary team with expertise in surveillance, laboratory, prevention, HIV testing services, health informatics, data management, data analytics, and supply chain to support the planning, implementation, and impact evaluation of this PEPFAR priority activity.

Through this Notice of Funding Opportunity Announcement (NOFO), the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) seeks to support routine laboratory-based surveillance of priority infectious diseases and lab confirmation of outbreaks in India by strengthening laboratory-based surveillance and specimen referral systems. This will involve advocacy and consultation/strategic planning meetings with various national and international stakeholders of human and veterinary sectors; training on routine laboratory-based surveillance and follow up. The identified laboratories should also be trained on biorisk management and safe packaging and referral of specimens using IATA-DGR (International Air Transport Association's Dangerous Goods Regulations).

CDC announces the availability of fiscal year (FY) 2020 funds to implement CDC-RFA-DP20-2007, the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS): Impact in Population Health. CDC established the BRFSS in 1984 with 15 states participating in monthly data collection. Since that time, the BRFSS has grown to be the only continuous, state-based health surveillance system that is conducted nationwide. The purpose of this Notice of Funding Opportunity (NOFO) is to provide financial and technical assistance to recipients to conduct health-related behavioral surveillance through the BRFSS and increase the use of BRFSS data to inform public health actions to improve health. The period of performance for this NOFO is three years with a 12-month budget period and an anticipated award date of August 1, 2020.

his FOA will assist Liberia in intensifying its surveillance of EVD through training Epidemiologists at the local and National level, providing National Epidemiologist EVD subject matter experts to assist County field teams in their work; as well as provide logistical support, supplies and equipment for Epidemiology Field teams to be able to conduct EVD surveillance. Laboratory systems will be strengthened through the assistance of a Senior Laboratory Data specialist, upgrades to the Laboratory Data Integration systems, and provision of much needed laboratory supplies, reagents, and equipment. EVD Chain of Transmission activities will include assessment of facilities throughout the country; and epidemiological active surveillance country wide, at the county level. Health Care Workers and community health leaders will be trained on water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) activities, and infection prevention and control (IPC) activities.

HIV surveillance and prevention program to prevent new HIV infections and achieve viral suppression among persons living with HIV. In particular, the FOA promotes and supports improving health outcomes for persons living with HIV through achieving and sustaining viral suppression, and reducing health-related disparities by using quality, timely, and complete surveillance and program data to guide HIV prevention efforts. These goals are in accordance with the national prevention goals, HIV Care Continuum, and CDC’s High-Impact HIV Prevention (HIP) approach. The integration of these programs allows each jurisdiction to operate in unison and maximize the impact of federal HIV prevention funding. An integrated FOA strengthens implementation of HIP by further allowing health departments to align resources to better match the geographic burden of HIV infections within their jurisdictions and improve data collection and use for public health action. The FOA priorities are to increase individual knowledge of HIV status, prevent new infections among HIV-negative persons, reduce transmission from persons living with HIV, and strengthen interventional surveillance to enhance response capacity and intensive data-to-care activities to support sustained viral suppression. Priority activities include (but are not limited to) HIV testing; linkage to, re-engagement in, and retention in care and support achieving viral suppression; pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) related activities; community-level HIV prevention activities; HIV transmission cluster investigations and outbreak response efforts.

High quality accessible strategic information (including surveillance, survey and routine monitoring and evaluation and health information data) is needed to monitor and evaluate the impact of PEPFAR programs, and to determine changes in disease prevalence and incidence in both general and high risk populations. While progress has been made in the recent years, weaknesses in the national strategic information supported by the Ministry of Health and the PEPFAR program still remain. This FOA is to build on the work of the previous FOA by providing technical assistance to increase the technical and organizational capacity of the Ministry of Health of (MOH) and other USG implementing partners, in the collection, quality, and validity of data and information systems used for monitoring, planning, and prioritization of the National program to combat HIV/AIDS. Activities listed under this FOA are intended to support the Ministry of Health and National Institute of Health in development of survey and surveillance programs, routine monitoring and evaluation (M&E), and health information systems (HIS) that are needed in the collection of vital statistics including HIV survey and surveillance, mortality statistics, disease modeling and develop demographic estimate projections related to HIV and other diseases. In developing individual and institutional capacity, including support for the development of budgeting and accountancy skills, and SOPs for the implementation of surveys, accountability, oversight skills, and human resource skills will aid in the development of future programs, guidelines, and more efficient utilization of data in national HIV/AIDS program.

The purpose of this FOA is to support a more efficient method for jurisdictions to de-duplicate the National HIV Surveillance System. The applicant will develop a privacy data-sharing tool capable of identifying potential duplicates across jurisdictions. Activities will include acquiring a Security Assessment and Authorization, negotiating with the 59 jurisdictions to obtain their participation, providing a data sharing tool that will allow for secure, encrypted submission and matching of person-level HIV surveillance data, and providing a report back to jurisdictions on matching levels.

The purpose of this NOFO is to support a more efficient method for HIV surveillance jurisdictions to identify potential interstate duplicates. The recipient will develop and provide a secure, encrypted, on-going privacy data-sharing tool capable of identifying potential duplicates across jurisdictions, implement necessary data security, confidentiality and privacy protections according to CDC standards, obtain participation agreements with 59 state and local health department HIV surveillance programs that will allow on demand submission and matching of person-level HIV surveillance data, and report back to jurisdictions on matching levels in formats that are importable into local/state HIV data systems.