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Innovative Uses of Electronic Health Records and Social Media for Public Health Surveillance

  • Health Care Delivery Systems in Diabetes (D Wexler, Section Editor)
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Abstract

Electronic health records (EHRs) and social media have the potential to enrich public health surveillance of diabetes. Clinical and patient-facing data sources for diabetes surveillance are needed given its profound public health impact, opportunity for primary and secondary prevention, persistent disparities, and requirement for self-management. Initiatives to employ data from EHRs and social media for diabetes surveillance are in their infancy. With their transformative potential come practical limitations and ethical considerations. We explore applications of EHR and social media for diabetes surveillance, limitations to approaches, and steps for moving forward in this partnership between patients, health systems, and public health.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by PO1HK000088-01 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), National Library of Medicine grants 5R01LM007677 and G08LM009778, grant 1U54RR025224-01 from NCRR/NIH, and grant 1R01AA021913-01 from the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. The study sponsors had no role in the design and conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; or in the preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript.

Emma M. Eggleston was Co-I on the CDC grant that funded the ESP-DM public health surveillance project.

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Conflict of Interest

Emma M. Eggleston and Elissa R. Weitzman declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Human and Animal Rights and Informed Consent

This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Population Medicine, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute and Harvard Medical School, 133 Brookline Avenue, Boston, MA, 02215, USA

    Emma M. Eggleston

  2. Brigham and Women’s Hospital Division of Endocrinology, Hypertension and Diabetes, 122 Longwood Avenue, Boston, MA, 02115, USA

    Emma M. Eggleston

  3. Children’s Hospital Informatics Program at the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA

    Elissa R. Weitzman

  4. Division of Adolescent Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA

    Elissa R. Weitzman

  5. Department of Pediatrics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    Elissa R. Weitzman

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  1. Emma M. Eggleston
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Correspondence to Emma M. Eggleston.

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This article is part of the Topical Collection on Health Care Delivery Systems in Diabetes

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Eggleston, E.M., Weitzman, E.R. Innovative Uses of Electronic Health Records and Social Media for Public Health Surveillance. Curr Diab Rep 14, 468 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11892-013-0468-7

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