AEGIS: a robust and scalable real-time public health surveillance system

• Published in: Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA Vol. 14; no. 5; pp. 581 - 588
• Main Authors: Reis, Ben Y, Kirby, Chaim, Hadden, Lucy E, Olson, Karen, McMurry, Andrew J, Daniel, James B, Mandl, Kenneth D
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: England American Medical Informatics Association 01-09-2007
• Subjects: Application of Information Technology; Bioterrorism; Communicable Diseases; Computer Systems; Disease Outbreaks; Humans; Massachusetts; Population Surveillance - methods; Public Health Informatics; Massachusetts
• ISSN: 1067-5027; 1527-974X
• DOI: 10.1197/jamia.M2342

In this report, we describe the Automated Epidemiological Geotemporal Integrated Surveillance system (AEGIS), developed for real-time population health monitoring in the state of Massachusetts. AEGIS provides public health personnel with automated near-real-time situational awareness of utilization patterns at participating healthcare institutions, supporting surveillance of bioterrorism and naturally occurring outbreaks. As real-time public health surveillance systems become integrated into regional and national surveillance initiatives, the challenges of scalability, robustness, and data security become increasingly prominent. A modular and fault tolerant design helps AEGIS achieve scalability and robustness, while a distributed storage model with local autonomy helps to minimize risk of unauthorized disclosure. The report includes a description of the evolution of the design over time in response to the challenges of a regional and national integration environment.