2013 ISDS Award for Outstanding Student Abstract: Awardees

The ISDS Research Committee developed the Award for Outstanding Student Abstract in order to recognize the exemplary work being done by students in the field of biosurveillance.

ISDS is please to announce the 2013 Awardees:

Katherine Harmon, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for the abstract ‘Utilization of Emergency Department Data for Drug Overdose Surveillance in North Carolina.’

Abstract Summary: The United States is in the midst of a drug overdose epidemic, primarily due to opioid analgesics. Emergency department data are an important source of morbidity data for public health surveillance. This population-based study will describe visits to North Carolina emergency departments for drug, and more specifically, opioid overdoses.

Mollie Kotzen, New York University for the abstract ‘Using Syndromic Surveillance to Investigate Tattoo-related Skin Infections in NYC.’

 

Abstract Summary: Mycobacterium chelonae is not reportable in NYC. To investigate tattoo-associated M. chelonae infections, we used NYC ED syndromic surveillance for case finding and trend analysis. No significant trend emerged from 5 years of ED surveillance data. Thirty-one ED visits for tattoo complications were identified in the five-month period preceding a reported case of M. chelonae. Fourteen patients were interviewed, and were suspected or confirmed with M. chelonae. Syndromic surveillance is an option for case finding when the event under surveillance is described by a unique and specific word or phrase, such as tattoo.

They will present their work at the 2013 ISDS Conference in December.

For more information about the award, please visit the Award webpage.