Disease prioritization tool (CIRAD-AviaGIS-CaribVET)
Disease prioritization tool (CIRAD-AviaGIS-CaribVET)
Very few countries/territories in the Caribbean have formalized a list of priority diseases that is, diseases for which surveillance and/or control should be considered as a priority by the health authority. The Epidemiology working group of CaribVET developed and released in 2012 a user friendly Disease Prioritisation tool (guideline and Excel Spreadsheet with macros included) available in 3 languages (English, Spanish and French). More information on the tool on the CaribVET website, here.
The tool aims at providing animal health interested parties and decisions makers of the Caribbean with a simple tool to select and prioritize diseases methodologically, without requiring particular expertise or resources. The tool was validated in the Dominican Republic during a disease prioritization workshop and has been further applied in several countries including in Jamaica where results were used to improve their surveillance.
Limitations
The detailed Jamaica experience and other feedbacks from users were used to upgrade the tool within the frame of the Epigenesis Project. Main limitations evidenced were:
- the need to limit variations of the scoring dependent on the person by improving method of score calculation to cope with uncertainty.
- Change the format as Excel tool was difficult to maintain in 3 languages.
Upgrade of the CaribVET tool
The new tool has been developed by AviaGIS in collaboration with the Epigroup of CaribVET. It has been developed under Window and is compatible with Mac. It is much simpler: only the necessary steps are displayed and some functionalities have been added (automatic storage of results in case of accidental deletion/closure of the tool, easy selection of diseases, button to send comments/questions …). The tool detects language settings on the computer and will display the English, French or Spanish version accordingly. Any other language will use the default English labels.
It has been presented during the 1st regional conference on animal health research and surveillance and the workplan has been established with the Epigroup during a meeting in Barbados, early July 2015. The final tool is being evaluated by end users and will be available upon request to CaribVET secretariat.
References:
J. Pradel, G. Ellis, L. Bournez, K. Hackshaw, J. Guitian, C. Zepeda, S. Titus, MI Percedo Abreu, MT Frías Lepoureau, W. Gonzales, V. Gongora. CaribVET Disease Prioritization Tool: a user friendly tool to list priority diseases in animal industries and countries with small economies. Application in Jamaica. 2nd International Conference on Animal Health Surveilllance. La Havana, Cuba, 7-9 May 2014. Short Oral Communication
Pradel J., Calvo F. CaribVET diseases prioritization tool – an even more user friendly tool to list priority diseases in animal industries and countries with small economies. 1st Regional conference on research and surveillance on emerging and vector-borne animal diseases: 21st April 2015, Espace Régional du Raizet, Abymes, Guadeloupe.
