EP-Assignment

Individual Assignment

The purpose of this assignment is to get some experience describing and analyzing a typical measles outbreak.  Here is the scenario:  You are an epidemiologist with the state immunization program.  Your Division Director wants information on a recent measles outbreak.  In particular, this outbreak has been in the news and your Director wants an analysis so he can respond to questions (eg “how come a third of the cases are in vaccinated persons – does the vaccine work?”).  The template attached is a very typical example of how you might respond to this request.  Fill in the rest of the template including:

 

         a graph representing the epidemiological curve of the outbreak,

         a narrative description of the salient features of the outbreak and the epi curve,

         an analysis of vaccine efficacy (including a calculation of vaccine efficacy for this outbreak), and

         a list of conclusions and recommendations for your Director based on your description and analyses.

The results of the case and contact investigations are below:

Case investigation:

A pediatrician had evaluated a 10-year-old child in the emergency department on May 10th, 2016 who was suspected to have Kawasaki disease. The child had arrived from India on May 8th and had developed a rash on May 9th. A review of medical records led the investigators to reconsider the rash illness in the 10-year-old child as a possible measles case following the laboratory confirmation of measles by IgM testing.

A total of 108 contacts were identified as exposed to the index case or to the siblings.  Of the 108, 100 were vaccinated and 7 were unvaccinated.  A total of twelve measles cases were diagnosed in this outbreak.  All cases are summarized in the table below. 

Case Description	Age	Onset date	Vaccination h/o	Lab Confirmed y/n
Index	10	09-May	no vaccine	y
sibling 1	7	23-May	no vaccine	y
sibling 2	9	26-May	no vaccine	n
father	34	26-May	1 MMR (no record)	y
contact - index	12 mo	27-May	no vaccine	y
pediatrician	51	28-May	3 MMRs	y
contact - siblings	47	03-Jun	1 MMR (no record)	y
contact - siblings	8	04-Jun	no vaccine	y
contact - siblings	7	05-Jun	no vaccine	y
contact - siblings	9	05-Jun	no vaccine	y
contact - siblings	10	06-Jun	2 MMRs	y

 

Measles assignment

Measles assignment
Criteria	Ratings	Pts
Analysis and narrative - accuracy of graph, accuracy of calculations, accuracy of interpretation
Conclusions and Recommendations (supported by the narrative and reflected key priorities in the outbreak)
Writing - grammar, spelling, professionalism