Epidemiological intelligence, investment in information technologies and new perspectives for the use of data in health surveillance

In the municipality of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the incorporation of the concept of epidemic intelligence and technological resources has supported new perspectives for the use of data by health surveillance, since the COVID-19 pandemic. This article presents the Epidemiological Intelligence Center (CIE) and the tools and products developed in its coordination. The CIE was inaugurated in March 2022, with a multiprofessional team, supported by the premises of transparency and integration of various data sources for early detection of changes in the trends of events of importance in Public Health. The initial acquisition of a data lake favored changes in the consumption, management and security processes for the data processed. This data lake currently stores the Carioca Base - a retrospective cohort of individuals with a history of COVID-19 vaccination and/or events related to the disease. Descriptive and analytical dashboards have been developed and made available, respectively for public use and for health surveillance administrators. An alert panel, aimed at monitoring trends in care in the urgency and emergency network, was implemented and subsidizes rapid response actions in the city’s territories. The CIE developed the concept of epidemiological intelligence in the Brazilian Unified National Health System and this paradigm shift was made possible by investments in physical/human resources, the integration of epidemiological, statistical and data science methods, as well as the incorporation of different data sources in data analysis.

Keywords:
Public Health Surveillance; Epidemiological Monitoring; Epidemics