Measuring underreporting and under-ascertainment in infectious disease datasets: a comparison of methods
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Open Access
- 11 February 2014
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Springer Nature in BMC Public Health
- Vol. 14 (1) , 147
- https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2458-14-147
Abstract
Efficient and reliable surveillance and notification systems are vital for monitoring public health and disease outbreaks. However, most surveillance and notification systems are affected by a degree of underestimation (UE) and therefore uncertainty surrounds the 'true’ incidence of disease affecting morbidity and mortality rates. Surveillance systems fail to capture cases at two distinct levels of the surveillance pyramid: from the community since not all cases seek healthcare (under-ascertainment), and at the healthcare-level, representing a failure to adequately report symptomatic cases that have sought medical advice (underreporting). There are several methods to estimate the extent of under-ascertainment and underreporting.Keywords
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