[Federal Register Volume 64, Number 8 (Wednesday, January 13, 1999)]
[Notices]
[Pages 2225-2227]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 99-724]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
[30DAY-05-99]


Agency Forms Undergoing Paperwork Reduction Act Review

    The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) publishes a 
list of information collection requests under review by the Office of 
Management and Budget (OMB) in compliance with the Paperwork Reduction 
Act (44 U.S.C. Chapter 35). To request a copy of these requests, call 
the CDC Reports Clearance Officer at (404) 639-7090. Send written 
comments to CDC, Desk Officer; Human Resources and Housing Branch, New 
Executive Office Building, Room 10235; Washington, DC 20503. Written 
comments should be received within 30 days of this notice.

Proposed Project

    1. Evaluating an Alert to Firefighters--New--National Institute of 
Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH)--The mission of the National 
Institute of Occupational Safety and Health is to promote ``safety and 
health at work for all people through research and prevention.'' NIOSH 
not only investigates and identifies occupational safety and health 
hazards, the Institute also develops recommendations for controlling 
those hazards and in some cases, distributes those recommendations 
directly to affected workplaces.
    One way that NIOSH accomplishes this kind of intervention is 
through the Alert. The Alert is usually a six to ten page document that 
outlines the nature of the hazard, the risks to workers, and the 
recommendations for controlling the hazard. Again, the Alert is mailed 
to workplaces potentially affected by the hazard.
    It is unclear, however, whether the Alert is effective in 
communicating the need for and methods for adopting NIOSH's 
recommendations for controlling the hazard. To-date, none of the Alerts 
have been rigorously evaluated, but preliminary research indicates that 
the Alert could be more effective at encouraging safer workplace 
practices.
    The Alert has traditionally followed a standard format that does 
not reflect current ``best practices'' in applied communications. In 
this study, NIOSH proposes incorporating several alternative 
communication strategies into an Alert and evaluating the effectiveness 
of these alternatives.
    The Alert chosen for this study is concerned with firefighters and 
the injuries and fatalities that result from structural collapse. In 
1998, Congress appropriated funds for NIOSH to conduct research and 
proceed with interventions that will reduce the number of fatalities 
among firefighters. Congress further instructed NIOSH to evaluate the 
effectiveness of any interventions. This Alert is intended to be 
directed at the 36,000 fire stations and 1.2 million career and 
volunteer firefighters across the country.
    NIOSH will vary the content of the Alert and add channels of 
information to inform, educate, and help fire stations adopt safer work 
practices. The goals of the study are twofold: 1) to reduce the risks 
of injury and fatality among firefighters, 2) identify the more 
effective ways to deliver vital health and s afety information in NIOSH 
Alerts. The study design will allow NIOSH to minimize costs while 
identifying the most effective strategies. The total annual burden 
hours are 320.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                   Number of     Avg. burden per
                         Respondents                              Number of        responses/      response (in
                                                                 respondents       respondent         hrs.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fire Chiefs..................................................             960                1            20/60
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    2. Surveillance for Bloodstream and Vascular Access Infections in 
Outpatient Hemodialysis Centers--New--National Center for Infectious 
Diseases (NCID). The Hospital Infections Program, NCID is proposing a 
study of bloodstream infections, vascular access infections, 
hospitalizations, and antimicrobial starts at U.S. outpatient 
hemodialysis centers. Although bloodstream and vascular access 
infections are common in hemodialysis patients, there is no existing 
system to record and track these complications. Participation in the 
proposed project is voluntary; it is estimated that 100 of the 
approximately 3,000 U.S. outpatient hemodialysis centers will 
participate. Participating centers may collect data continuously, or 
may discontinue participation at any time; we estimate that the average 
center will participate for six months. Each month, participating 
centers will record the number of hemodialysis patients they treat and 
maintain a log of all hospitalizations and intravenous (IV) 
antimicrobial starts. For each hospitalization or IV antimicrobial 
start, further information (e.g., type of

[[Page 2226]]

vascular access, clinical symptoms, presence of a vascular access 
infection, and blood culture results) will be collected. A computer 
program will be developed to allow dialysis center personnel to enter 
and analyze their own data; they will also transmit the data to CDC 
with all patient identifiers removed. CDC will aggregate this data and 
generate reports which will be sent to participating dialysis centers. 
Rates of bloodstream infection, vascular access infection, and 
antimicrobial use per 1000 patient-days will be calculated. Also, the 
percentage of antimicrobial starts for which a blood culture is 
performed will be calculated. Through use of these data, dialysis 
centers will be able to track rates of key infectious complications of 
hemodialysis. This will facilitate quality control improvements to 
reduce the incidence of infections, and clinical practice guidelines to 
improve use of antimicrobials. The total annual burden hours are 5,200.

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                                                                                     Number of     Avg. burden/
                              Form                                   Number of      responses/     response (in
                                                                    respondents     respondent         hrs.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Agreement to Participate........................................             100               1               1
Census Form.....................................................             100              12            .083
Log.............................................................             100          \1\ 10               1
Incident Form...................................................             100         \1\ 200            0.2
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\1\ Estimated Mean.

    3. Prevention of HIV Infection in Youth at Risk: Developing 
Community-Level Intervention Strategies that Work--New--The National 
Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention (NCHSTP) purpose of this survey 
is to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention to reduce risk 
behaviors associated with HIV infection or transmission among young men 
of various race/ethnic groups. Across 10 cities, data will be collected 
in the intervention and comparison areas, and it will be used to assess 
risk behaviors associated with HIV acquisition and transmission, 
determinants of those behaviors, and to monitor awareness and contact 
with the intervention. It is hoped that this intervention study will 
result in lowering HIV risk behaviors among young men in the target 
audiences, and strengthening HIV prevention programs in these local 
communities. The total annual burden hours are 3,380.

                                   Table 1.--Pilot Testing (March-April 1999)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                      Number
                                                     Number of     responses per   Hrs/response      Response
                                                    respondents     respondent                        burden
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Identify venues for sampling frames using
 Eligibility Screener (BSI).....................           2,340               1            1/60              39
Eligibility Screener (BSI)......................             858               1            1/60              15
Respondent informed consent.....................             390               1            3/60              20
Full interview (QTI)............................             390               1           20/60             130
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                      Table 2.--Pre-Intervention Round of Data Collection (May-August 1999)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                      Number
                                                     Number of     responses per   Hrs/response      Response
                                                    respondents     respondent                        burden
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eligibility Screener (BSI)......................           7,143               1            1/60             119
Respondent informed consent.....................           3,250               1            3/60             163
Full interview (QTI)............................           3,250               1           20/60           1,084
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


                         Table 3.--Monitoring Round of Data Collection (May-August 2000)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                      Number
                                                     Number of     responses per   Hrs/ response     Response
                                                    respondents     respondent                        burden
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eligibility Screener (BSI)......................           7,143               1            1/60             119
Respondent informed consent.....................           3,250               1            3/60             163
Full interview (QTI)............................           3,250               1           20/60           1,084
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


                         Table 4.--Monitoring Round of Data Collection (May-August 2001)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                      Number
                                                     Number of     responses per   Hrs/response      Response
                                                    respondents     respondent                        burden
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eligibility Screener (BSI)......................           7,143               1            1/60             119
Respondent informed consent.....................           3,250               1            3/60             163
Full interview (QTI)............................           3,250               1           20/60           1,084
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


[[Page 2227]]


                     Table 5.--Post-Intervention Round of Data Collection (May-August 2002)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                      Number
                                                     Number of     responses per   Hrs/response      Response
                                                    respondents     respondent                        burden
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eligibility Screener (BSI)......................           7,143               1            1/60             119
Respondent informed consent.....................           3,250               1            3/60             163
Full interview (QTI)............................           3,250               1           20/60           1,084
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    The State and Local Area Integrated Telephone Survey (SLAITS) 
(0920-0406)--Extension--The National Center for Health Statistics, 
(NCHS) is planning to expand from the short term pilot study phase to a 
long term integrated and coordinated survey system designed to collect 
needed health and welfare data at the state and local levels. Using the 
random-digit-dialing sampling frame from the ongoing National 
Immunization Survey (NIS) and Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing 
(CATI), the State and Local Area Integrated Telephone Survey (SLAITS) 
can quickly collect and produce data to monitor health status, child 
and family well-being, health care utilization, access to care, program 
participation, and changes in health care coverage at the state and 
local levels. These efforts are conducted in cooperation with state and 
local officials. SLAITS offers a centrally administered data collection 
mechanism with standardized questionnaires and quality control measures 
which allow comparability of estimates between states, over time, and 
with national data. As demonstrated in the pilot study phase, SLAITS is 
designed to allow for oversampling of population subdomains and to meet 
federal, state and local needs for subnational estimates which are 
compatible with national data.
    Questionnaire content is drawn from existing surveys such as the 
National Health Interview Survey (NHIS), the National Health and 
Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), the Current Population Survey 
(CPS), the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), the 
National Household Education Survey, and the National Survey of 
America's Families, as well as the three questionnaire modules that 
were developed for SLAITS during the pilot study phase. These modules 
include Health, Child Well-Being and Welfare, and Children's Health 
Insurance and Health Care Utilization.
    The strategy of building on established survey systems provides 
several advantages. It is less costly than establishing a new system; 
the proposed questions have been thoroughly tested; and implementation 
can occur rapidly. Basing SLAITS on questions from the NHIS, CPS, and 
other national in-person surveys will allow for comparisons with 
national data. In addition, the quality of the estimates developed from 
the telephone survey can be improved with adjustments for households 
without telephones using health and socio-demographic information from 
telephone and non telephone households from the NHIS and other in-
person surveys.
    Funding for SLAITS is being sought through a variety of mechanisms 
including Foundation grants, State collaborations, and federal 
appropriation and evaluation monies. The level of implementation will 
depend on the amount of funding received and can be expanded as funding 
permits. Questionnaire modules will be compiled to address the data 
needs of interest to the federal, state or local funding agency or 
organization. The total annual burden hours are 30,870.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                     Number of    Average burden/
                           Respondents                               Number of      responses/     response (in
                                                                    respondents     respondents        hrs.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Noninstitutionalized household population in 50 States and D.C..         102,000               1            0.30
Pretest modules.................................................             900               1            0.30
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Nancy Cheal,
Acting Associate Director for Policy, Planning and Evaluation, Centers 
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
[FR Doc. 99-724 Filed 1-12-99; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4163-18-P