[Federal Register Volume 65, Number 43 (Friday, March 3, 2000)]
[Notices]
[Pages 11581-11583]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 00-5131]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

[60Day-00-26]


Proposed Data Collections Submitted for Public Comment and 
Recommendations

    In compliance with the requirement of section 3506(c)(2)(A) of the 
Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, the Center for Disease Control and 
Prevention is providing opportunity for public comment on proposed data 
collection projects. To request more information on the proposed 
projects or to obtain a copy of the data collection plans and 
instruments, call the CDC Reports Clearance Officer on (404) 639-7090.
    Comments are invited on: (a) Whether the proposed collection of 
information is necessary for the proper performance of the functions of 
the agency, including whether the information shall have practical 
utility; (b) the accuracy of the agency's estimate of the burden of the 
proposed collection of information; (c) ways to enhance the quality, 
utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (d) ways 
to minimize the burden of the collection of information on respondents, 
including through the use of automated collection techniques for other 
forms of information technology. Send comments to Seleda Perryman, CDC 
Assistant Reports Clearance Officer, 1600 Clifton Road, MS-D24, 
Atlanta, GA 30333. Written comments should be received within 60 days 
of this notice.

Proposed Project

    1. Information Collection Procedures for Requesting Public Health 
Assessments--(0923-0002)--EXTENSION--The Agency for Toxic Substances 
and Disease Registry (ATSDR) is announcing the request for extension of 
the OMB approval for the Information Collection Procedures for 
Requesting Public Health Assessments. ATSDR is authorized to accept and 
respond to petitions from the public that request public health 
assessments of sites where there is a threat of exposure to hazardous 
substances (42 U.S.C. 9604(i)(6)(B)). The Agency conducts public health 
assessments of releases or facilities for which individuals provide 
information that people have been exposed to a hazardous substance, and 
for which the source of such exposure is a release, as defined under 
CERCLA. The general administrative procedures for conducting public 
health assessments, including the information that must be submitted 
with each request, is described at 42 CFR 90.3, 90.4, and 90.5. 
Procedures for responding to petitions, decision criteria, and 
methodology for determining priorities may be found at 57 FR 37382-89. 
There is no cost to the respondents other than their time.
    ATSDR anticipates approximately 36 requests will be received each 
year. This estimate is based on the number of requests received since 
the enabling legislation was enacted and the expressions of interest 
(via telephone, letter, etc.) from members of the public, attorneys, 
and industry representatives.

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                                                                    No. of
                 Respondents                   Annual number      responses/      Avg. hourly      Total burden
                                               of respondents     respondent    burden/response       hours
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General public..............................              36                1              .50               18
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    2. National Survey of Family Growth, Cycle 6 Pretest (0920-0314)--
Reinstatement--The National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS)--The 
National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) has been conducted periodically 
by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) since 1973--in 
1973, 1976, 1982, 1988, and 1995. The purpose of the NSFG is to provide 
national statistics on ``family formation, growth, and dissolution'' 
(Section 306 of the Public Health Service Act). This includes data on 
factors affecting birth, pregnancy rates, and family formation--such as 
sexual activity, marriage, divorce, cohabitation, contraception, 
infertility, miscarriage, and wanted and unwanted births. The social, 
economic (e.g., education, income, and work), and health factors (such 
as low birth weight and receipt of health care) associated with them 
are also collected. The target universe of the NSFG has always been 
women in the civilian non-institutional population of reproductive age 
(15-44). The population in this pretest includes an independent sample 
of men (15-49), in order to collect data related to male fertility, 
marriage and divorce, and parenting, as well as data to measure the 
risk of HIV (the virus that causes AIDS) and other sexually transmitted 
diseases.
    NSFG data are used by NCHS, the National Institute for Child Health 
and Human Development (NICHD), the Office of Population Affairs, the 
CDC HIV Prevention program, the Office of the Assistant Secretary for 
Planning and Evaluation (OASPE/DHHS), and the Children's Bureau. 
Specific uses include the Healthy People 2000 and 2010 objectives, 
reporting to Congress required by the 1996 Personal Responsibility and 
Work Opportunity Act (Sections 905 and 906), the DHHS Fatherhood 
Initiative, and the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, among 
others. Data are published by NCHS, in professional journals, used by 
private academic and nonprofit researchers, and cited by journalists 
and others.
    The NSFG Cycle 6 pretest will include interviews with about 600 
males and 600 females and will test a variety of procedures to improve 
the quality and usefulness of the data. The interviews are conducted in 
person by trained female interviewers in respondents homes. Interviews 
average 60 minutes for males and 80 minutes for females. Remuneration 
is proposed, and will be the subject of an experiment in the pretest. 
The pretest is in preparation for a main study that will include 
interviews with 7,200 males and 11,800 females in 2001 or 2002. There 
is no cost to the respondent.

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                                                                      No. of        Avg. burden      Response
                   Respondents                        No. of        responses/     per responses    burden  (in
                                                    respondents     respondent       (in hrs.)         hrs.)
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Screening.......................................            2000               1            5/60             167
Interviewing:

[[Page 11582]]

 
  Males.........................................             600               1               1             600
  Females.......................................             600               1           80/60             800
Verification....................................             200               1            5/60              17
Cognitive.......................................             100               1               1             100
 
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    3. National Nosocomial Infections Surveillance (NNIS) system--
Renwal--National Center for Infectious Disease (NCID). The most recent 
renewal of the NNIS system (OMB No. 0920-0012) was in 1997. The NNIS 
system, which was instituted in 1970, is an ongoing surveillance system 
currently involving 315 hospitals that voluntarily report their 
nosocomial infections data to the Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention (CDC), who aggregates the data into a national database. The 
data are collected using surveillance protocols developed by CDC for 
high risk patient groups (ICU, high-risk nursery, and surgical 
patients). Instructional manuals, training of surveillance personnel, 
and a computer surveillance software are among the support that CDC 
provides without cost to participating hospitals to ensure the 
reporting of accurate and uniform data.
    The purpose of the NNIS system is to provide national data on the 
incidence of nosocomial infections and their risk factors, and on 
emerging antibiotic resistance. The data are used to determine the 
magnitude of various nosocomial infection problems and trends in 
infection rates among patients with similar risks. They are used to 
detect changes in the epidemiology of nosocomial infections resulting 
from new medical therapies and changing patient risks. New to the NNIS 
system is the monitoring of antibiotic resistance and antimicrobial use 
in groups of patients to describe the epidemiology of antibiotic 
resistance and to understand the role of antimicrobial therapy to this 
growing problem. The NNIS system can also serve as a sentinel system 
for the detection of nosocomial infection outbreaks in the event of 
national distribution of a contaminated medical product or device.
    The respondent burden is not the same in each hospital since the 
hospitals can select from a wide variety of surveillance options. A 
typical hospital will monitor patients for infections in two ICUs and 
surgical site infections following 3 surgical operations. The 
respondent burden includes the time and cost to collect data on 
nosocomial infections in patients in these groups and the denominator 
data to characterize risk factors in the patients who are being 
monitored; to enter the data as well as a surveillance plan into the 
surveillance software; to send the data to CDC by electronic 
transmission; and complete a short annual survey and administrative 
forms. The respondent burden is expected to increase since an estimated 
10 hospitals are expected to enroll into the NNIS system each year. 
There is no cost to the respondent.

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                                                                     Number of    Average burden/
                      Year                           Number of      responses/     response  (in   Total burden
                                                    respondents     respondent        hours)        (in hours)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2000............................................             315               1             950         290,260
2001............................................             325               1             923         299,985
2002............................................             335               1             967         309,979
    Total.......................................  ..............  ..............  ..............         900,224
                                                                                                 ---------------
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    4. Audience-Derived Input Regarding the Usability of the Main Web 
Site for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention--New--As the 
nations lead agency for health promotion and disease prevention, the 
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) serves as a role model 
for incorporating health communication into an overall strategy of 
targeting audiences for intervention. In recent years, the Internet and 
other new technologies have opened up many new possibilities for 
communicating messages about health. Although these new technologies 
have yielded great opportunities for reaching diverse populations, they 
have also created new challenges. Increased options permit the general 
public greater freedom to be selective about the types and sources of 
information to which they give their attention; greater choice leads to 
increased expectations for greater sophistication. As the technology 
stakes are raised, the public's desire for information to be 
interactive, stimulating, accurate, up-to-date, and individually 
tailored to their needs will continue to grow.
    The main web site (www.cdc.gov) maintained by the CDC has evolved 
rapidly since its inception in 1994. Although the CDC has sought to 
continually meet the information needs of its users, this task has 
become more difficult as these needs have increased or changed and new 
audiences have emerged. The CDC is currently seeking to evaluate the 
current site and assess its effectiveness in meeting the needs of its 
target audiences.
    The goal of the CDC's Web Site Redesign & Continuous Improvement 
Project is to obtain input from both current and potential users. An 
on-line survey will be conducted with general public Internet users to 
explore how, when, and why users search the Web to obtain health 
information; the types of information sought; characteristics that are 
important to them in a health-related web site; and sites they have 
visited. Additionally, users exiting the CDC web site will have the 
opportunity to complete a survey, known as a bounceback form, that will 
ask them about their reactions to the site. Information on the 
estimated annual respondent burden is shown in the table below. The 
total cost to respondents is $0.00.

[[Page 11583]]



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                                                                     Number of      Avg. burden
                   Respondents                       Number of      responses/     per response    Total burden
                                                    respondents     respondent       (in hrs.)       (in hrs.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
General public responding to on-line survey.....            1000               1             .25             250
Users of www.cdc.gov responding to a bounce back          10,000               1             .20           2,000
 form...........................................
 
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    Dated: February 28, 2000.
Charles Gollmar,
Acting Associate Director for Policy, Planning, and Evaluation, Centers 
for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
[FR Doc. 00-5131 Filed 3-2-00; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4163-18-P