Evaluating Oregon's occupational public health surveillance system based on the CDC updated guidelines

Abstract

Background: The Oregon Occupational Public Health Program (OOPHP) monitors occupational health indicators (OHIs) to inform occupational safety and health (OSH) surveillance. In 2018, OOPHP evaluated the performance of the OSH surveillance system and identified areas for future improvement.

Methods: Following the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) updated guidelines for evaluating public health surveillance systems, the OOPHP evaluation team engaged internal and external stakeholders using a mixed-methods approach. Operational measures for ten surveillance attributes were developed. Multiple data collection methods resulted in credible evidence for evaluation conclusions. Analyses included summary statistics and qualitative analysis of interviews, a focus group, and online surveys.

Results: Twenty stakeholders took part in this evaluation, with an average participation rate of 55%. Results showed the Oregon OSH surveillance system was simple, flexible, and highly accepted by its stakeholders. Funding security presents challenges for stability. A lack of timeliness of OHIs, low relevance of OHIs to local OSH issues, and the system's ineffectual data dissemination all limit the usefulness of the OSH surveillance system. A review of key data sources for the system showed good data quality and predictive value positive, but relatively poor sensitivity and representativeness.

Conclusions: The evaluation team successfully adapted attributes and examples in the CDC guidelines to this Oregon OSH surveillance evaluation. The evaluation findings have informed the development of recommendations for improvements to OOPHP's OSH surveillance. Future research is needed to develop guidance specific to OSH surveillance evaluation.

Keywords: occupational health indicators; occupational safety and health surveillance; surveillance evaluation.