OH-EpiCap Tool: Evaluation tool for One Health Epidemiological Surveillance Capacities and Capabilities.
Link to the web version of the tool: https://freddietafreeth.shinyapps.io/OH-EpiCap/. This repository contains the code for the OH-EpiCap Tool, developed published in Frontiers, by Henok Ayalew Tegegne1, Carlijn Bogaardt2, Lucie Collineau1, Géraldine Cazeau1, Renaud Lailler3, Johana Reinhardt1, Frederick T. A. Freeth2, Emma Taylor2, Joaquin M. Prada2, and Viviane Hénaux1. (2023). OH-EpiCap: A semi-quantitative tool for the evaluation of one health epidemiological surveillance capacities and capabilities. Frontiers in Public Health, 11, 1053986. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2023.1053986.
1 University of Lyon - Agence Nationale de Sécurité Sanitaire de L'Alimentation, de L'Environnement et du Travail (ANSES), Laboratory of Lyon, Epidemiology and Support to Surveillance Unit, Lyon, France
2 School of Veterinary Medicine, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Surrey, Guildford, United Kingdom
3 University of Paris Est - Agence Nationale de Sécurité Sanitaire de L'Alimentation, de L'Environnement et du Travail (ANSES), Laboratory for Food Safety, Maisons-Alfort, France
The OH-EpiCap tool aims to develop system-specific profiles of (potential) surveillance interoperability between sectors, highlighting both strengths and gaps in surveillance capacities and capabilities.
The OH-EpiCap tool allows evaluation and improvement of ‘One Health (OH)-ness’ using a set of standardized indicators, which allows comparison across systems, countries and hazards of interest. Countries at similar levels of ‘OH-ness’, including similar capacities, limitations and resources, can potentially collaborate to develop a common framework for OH Surveillance that will address zoonotic threats across borders. This will improve national OH structures, including surveillance and data analysis, while also facilitating better integration of multinational collaboration. Countries at different levels of ‘OH-ness’ and surveillance capacity/resources can share experiences regarding surveillance practice against the same pathogen, transfer knowledge and share ideas to improve surveillance quality and efficacy across settings.
The OH-EpiCap tool facilitates discussion between surveillance representatives from different disciplines and programs, encouraging a more collaborative OH approach. It is based on a standalone interactive web-based application, which allows a panel with representatives from all sectors within the system being evaluated to complete an in-country surveillance evaluation. The tool focuses on evaluating “One Heath-ness” across three dimensions:
- Dimension 1: Organization of the OH surveillance system
- Dimension 2: OH-ness in operational activities of the OH surveillance system
- Dimension 3: Impact of the OH surveillance system
Some of the features of the tool include:
- Evaluation of 'OH-ness' across the three dimensions
- Interactive visualisation of results
- Benchmarking tool to compare to other One Health Surveillance systems
The OH-EpiCap tool has been developed by the MATRIX consortium, a joint integrative project funded by the One Health European Joint Programme. The MATRIX consortium aims to advance the implementation of OH surveillance in practice, by building onto existing resources, adding value to them, and creating synergies among the sectors at the national level. One activity has been the development of the generic benchmarking tool presented here, for characterizing, monitoring, and evaluating epidemiological surveillance capacities and capabilities, which directly contribute to OH surveillance. The tool aims to identify and describe the collaborations among actors involved in the surveillance of a hazard and to characterize the OH-ness of the surveillance system. The tool will support identification of areas that could lead to improvements in existing OH surveillance capacities. More information is available here: OH-EpiCap tool flyer and OH-EpiCap tool user guide.