HHS enlists military medical surveillance in flu fight

Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs systems and databases figure prominently in the plans by the Department of Health & Human Services to monitor immunization safety for H1N1 influenza vaccination program.

HHS issued detailed plans for cross-agency cooperation in the monitoring effort yesterday.

"A robust plan for monitoring adverse events following immunization during mass vaccination for 2009 H1N1 influenza is a critical component to ensure the safety of these vaccines," according to the  HHS document released Nov. 3.

The Defense Medical Surveillance System (DMSS) will be used as an active medical surveillance system for the United States military. "The DMSS can query personnel and relational medical databases that contain information on demographics, inpatient and outpatient visits, vaccination, and deployment," noted the HHS plan.

"For each individual, the DMSS can connect temporal relationships between vaccination and interactions with the Military Health System."

DoD will also be using registries to evaluate the health outcomes of newborn infants and their mothers who have been inoculated with the H1N1 vaccination.

The Department of Veterans Affairs is conducting a pilot evaluation of 1.1 million VA patients in collaboration with the FDA.  "Data from VA’s linked automated national databases (vaccine administration, ICD-9 codes, laboratory, demographics, geographic regions) are merged at the unique patient level and the rate of events will be assessed," said the HHS document.

"VA database offers the opportunity to study populations that might otherwise be difficult to capture," it noted.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration, the National Institutes of Health, the Health Resources and Services Administration, and the Indian Health Service are also participating in the DHS monitoring plan.