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Health plans watch for bioterror symptoms

Emergency Management Alert, April 28, 2003

As fears of bioterrorism grow, a pilot program conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care to detect potential bioterror attacks is helping track early signs of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in the U.S., National Journal reports. Soon, several other large health plans will also participate in the program.

The CDC last year awarded a $1.2 million grant to New England-based Harvard Pilgrim to begin collecting and analyzing information about certain respiratory and gastrointestinal symptoms that might mark the beginning of a bioterrorism attack. Harvard Pilgrim will soon act as a data-processing hub as plans including United Healthcare, HealthPartners in Minnesota, and Kaiser Permanente in Colorado submit patient information for the project.

Many state public health agencies have already begun developing ways to track emergency room visits and sales of over-the-counter drugs such as anti-diarrhea medicine. Conducting surveillance through health plans may be quicker than tracking emergency room visits, since members often report symptoms to their health plan first before going to a hospital.

The program only works with physicians who store patient medical records electronically. At the end of each day, the computer at the doctor's office, clinic, or nurse call-in line automatically checks the day's records for specified symptoms. The findings from each office are transmitted without names or identifying information to Harvard Pilgrim, which combines all the data. It sorts final data by ZIP code and compares to norms for the region and the time of year.

Harvard Pilgrim notifies public health officials once a month about spikes in respiratory or gastrointestinal symptoms, but none reported so far is related to bioterrorism.

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