Development and delivery of a real-time hospital-onset COVID-19 surveillance system using network analysis
File(s)
Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Background
Understanding nosocomial acquisition, outbreaks and transmission chains in real-time will be fundamental to ensuring infection prevention measures are effective in controlling COVID-19 in healthcare. We report the design and implementation of a hospital-onset COVID-19 infection (HOCI) surveillance system for an acute healthcare setting to target prevention interventions.
Methods
The study took place in a large teaching hospital group in London, UK. All patients tested for SARS-CoV-2 between 4th March and 14th April 2020 were included. Utilising data routinely collected through electronic healthcare systems we developed a novel surveillance system for determining and reporting HOCI incidence and providing real-time network analysis. We provided daily reports on incidence and trends over time to support HOCI investigation, and generated geo-temporal reports using network analysis to interrogate admission pathways for common epidemiological links to infer transmission chains. By working with stakeholders the reports were co-designed for end users.
Results
Real-time surveillance reports revealed: changing rates of HOCI throughout the course of the COVID-19 epidemic; key wards fuelling probable transmission events; HOCIs over-represented in particular specialities managing high-risk patients; the importance of integrating analysis of individual prior pathways; and the value of co-design in producing data visualisation. Our surveillance system can effectively support national surveillance.
Conclusions
Through early analysis of the novel surveillance system we have provided a description of HOCI rates and trends over time using real-time shifting denominator data. We demonstrate the importance of including the analysis of patient pathways and networks in characterising risk of transmission and targeting infection control interventions.
Understanding nosocomial acquisition, outbreaks and transmission chains in real-time will be fundamental to ensuring infection prevention measures are effective in controlling COVID-19 in healthcare. We report the design and implementation of a hospital-onset COVID-19 infection (HOCI) surveillance system for an acute healthcare setting to target prevention interventions.
Methods
The study took place in a large teaching hospital group in London, UK. All patients tested for SARS-CoV-2 between 4th March and 14th April 2020 were included. Utilising data routinely collected through electronic healthcare systems we developed a novel surveillance system for determining and reporting HOCI incidence and providing real-time network analysis. We provided daily reports on incidence and trends over time to support HOCI investigation, and generated geo-temporal reports using network analysis to interrogate admission pathways for common epidemiological links to infer transmission chains. By working with stakeholders the reports were co-designed for end users.
Results
Real-time surveillance reports revealed: changing rates of HOCI throughout the course of the COVID-19 epidemic; key wards fuelling probable transmission events; HOCIs over-represented in particular specialities managing high-risk patients; the importance of integrating analysis of individual prior pathways; and the value of co-design in producing data visualisation. Our surveillance system can effectively support national surveillance.
Conclusions
Through early analysis of the novel surveillance system we have provided a description of HOCI rates and trends over time using real-time shifting denominator data. We demonstrate the importance of including the analysis of patient pathways and networks in characterising risk of transmission and targeting infection control interventions.
Date Issued
2021-01-01
Date Acceptance
2020-07-01
Citation
Clinical Infectious Diseases, 2021, 72 (1), pp.82-89
ISSN
1058-4838
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Start Page
82
End Page
89
Journal / Book Title
Clinical Infectious Diseases
Volume
72
Issue
1
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press for the Infectious Diseases Society of America. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial reproduction and distribution of the work, in any medium, provided the original work is not altered or transformed in any way, and that the work is properly cited. For commercial re-use, please contact journals.permissions@oup.com
Sponsor
Engineering & Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC)
Identifier
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciaa892/5868508
Grant Number
EP/N014529/1
Subjects
COVID-19
SARS-Cov-2
hospital-onset infection
network analysis
surveillance
COVID-19
Hospitals
Humans
London
SARS-CoV-2
United Kingdom
Humans
Hospitals
London
United Kingdom
COVID-19
SARS-CoV-2
Microbiology
06 Biological Sciences
11 Medical and Health Sciences
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2020-07-07