AUSTRALIA–INDONESIA JOINT SYMPOSIUM IN SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
Jakarta, 13-17 September 2006
Development of Early Warning Outbreak Recognition System (EWORS) in Indonesia
Dr Endang Rahayu Sedyaningsih-Mamahit, National Institute of Health Research and Development
EWORS was first developed by the National Institute of Health Research and Development in collaboration with the US Naval Medical Research Unit-2 Jakarta (Namru2) in 1998. The rational of developing this system was to respond to the fact that disease outbreaks were still frequent in this country, and that those occurrences were often detected late, causing delays in response and usually had already caused high morbidity and mortality. A standardized epidemiology surveillance that was more sensitive and responsive to outbreaks was definitely needed. EWORS was not designed to replace the existing surveillance system, but as a complement device.
EWORS allows us to collect and disseminate real time data; it is also relatively easy to implement because it is menu driven and user friendly. The system is based on disease symptoms, and not disease etiology. Clustering of cases in certain geographic areas can be immediately seen, and, therefore, appropriate actions can be promptly taken. Public health authorities can conduct simple and quick analyses using available programs, to see the disease distributions by sex, age group, address, and symptoms.
Eleven hospitals were recruited in a step wise fashion, and the NIHRD and NAMRU-2 have trained and provided them with the necessary equipment. This presentation will describe the progress and the problems faced by NIHRD, as well as the local hospitals, in executing the program after 8 years of developing and implementing EWORS in Indonesia.
