[Federal Register Volume 75, Number 86 (Wednesday, May 5, 2010)]
[Notices]
[Pages 24705-24706]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2010-10586]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

[60 Day-10-10CV]


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 for opportunity for public comment on 
proposed data collection projects, the Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention (CDC) will publish periodic summaries of proposed projects. 
Alternatively, to obtain a copy of the data collection plans and 
instrument, call 404-639-5960 and send comments to Maryam I. Daneshvar, 
CDC Reports Clearance Officer, 1600 Clifton Road, NE., MS-D74, Atlanta, 
Georgia 30333; comments may also be sent by e-mail to [email protected].
    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 a 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 clarify 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 information technology. Written comments 
should be received within 60 days of this notice.

Proposed Project

    Early Aberration Reporting System (EARS) Registration Module--New--
National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases (NCEZID) 
(proposed), Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Background and Brief Description

    To support two of CDC's main priority areas: (1) Improving CDC's 
support for state and local health departments, and (2) strengthening 
surveillance and epidemiology, CDC is requesting approval from the 
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to improve the Early Aberration 
Reporting System (EARS) by collecting data from individuals who request 
a download of EARS from the CDC website.
    The Early Aberration Reporting System, developed within the 
Division of Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response, is a web-enabled 
tool that analyzes public health surveillance data using methods that 
detect abnormal trends that could possibly indicate an outbreak of 
infectious disease. The local public health professionals manage the 
entire tool and can implement the defaults or can adjust the tool in 
order to meet their local needs. The goal of this process is to assist 
public health professionals in the early identification of outbreaks of 
disease as well as bioterrorism events. EARS is used to assess whether 
the current number of reported cases of an event is higher than usual.
    The term syndromic surveillance is used to describe surveillance 
that uses health-related data that precede diagnosis and that signals a 
sufficient probability of a case or an outbreak of infectious disease 
to warrant further public health response. Syndromic surveillance 
systems are used by state, local, national and international health 
departments to monitor syndrome-based (e.g., case information collected 
in emergency departments (EDs) and diagnostic data sources for early 
detection of outbreaks and other public health events). More recently 
these systems are used during public health responses to provide more 
rapid near real-time situational awareness regarding the health status 
of the target population. EARS was the first software platform to 
support local syndromic surveillance systems. EARS has been designed 
and used to monitor syndromic data from emergency departments, 911 
calls, physician office data, school and business absenteeism, over-
the-counter drug sales, laboratory testing and results data and 
reportable disease surveillance systems. In the past several years, 
EARS systems have been integral in the local public health surveillance 
arsenal. EARS has been used at events such as the Beijing Summer 
Olympics; multiple

[[Page 24706]]

Superbowls (football) and World Series (baseball); the political 
conventions of both major US political parties; and the Presidential 
Inauguration (2009).
    Today, EARS is a highly successful and sustainable system and has 
over 200 users at the Federal, State, local, and international levels. 
These users include international Ministries of Health and domestic 
state and local public health departments. Additionally, EARS detection 
methods have been integrated in well-known surveillance platforms such 
as BioSense at CDC, ESSENSE at Johns Hopkins, NAMRD at US Department of 
Defense, and Emergint at Northrop Grumman.
    EARS is widely-accepted and easily sustainable due to its being 
free to all end users, the capacity to use multiple forms of data, 
flexibility and user-driven design and maintenance. EARS is a service 
provided by CDC as share-ware and is available by download at no cost 
from the CDC Web site http://www.bt.cdc.gov/surveillance/EARS.
    In an effort to continue to improve and enhance EARS, the 
collection of registration information is needed to track users and 
organizations to assist in future needs assessments. Requiring the 
users to register will provide CDC with contact information (i.e., e-
mail addresses) to use for broadcast e-mails regarding new releases for 
upgrades and enhancements; track the number of users, the download 
frequency, and the type of data that users will monitor with EARS; and 
solicit users for feedback for future upgrades and enhancements. CDC 
estimates that there will be 150 respondents registered for EARS. Each 
respondent will need an average of 10 minutes to complete the EARS 
registration form which leads to a total public burden of 25 hours.
    There is no cost to respondents to participate in this program.

                                       Estimate of Annualized Burden Hours
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                                                                     Number of    Average burden
                   Respondents                       Number of     responses per   per response    Total burden
                                                    respondents     respondent      (in hours)      (in hours)
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Users...........................................             150               1           10/60              25
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    Dated: April 21, 2010.
Maryam I. Daneshvar,
Acting Reports Clearance Officer, Centers for Disease Control and 
Prevention.
[FR Doc. 2010-10586 Filed 5-4-10; 8:45 am]
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