Establishment and application of media surveillance system for public health risk information

Objective To increase the source of public health surveillance information,improve the early warning ability for public health emergency in CDC system,make full use of media information and conduct early intervention and timely response. Methods By using net-web platform technique and RSS (Really Simple Syndication),the surveillance on more than 1000 Chinese news media websites in Internet was conducted to search public health risk information,and the information was classified by computer and timely released on website. Results The expectancy to establish this surveillance system has been realized,public health risk information can be obtained from the most of media websites and released timely on the public health risk communication website (www.riskcommunication.org.cn) after classification. The system has good acceptability. The information can be classified by region,type,time and visiting rate,and the RSS information service can be provided. Conclusions The media surveillance system can provide the needed public health information to the public or professional personnel by area,interest and hot point. As a tool of public health information collection and media surveillance,the system will play a role in disease prevention,early detection and timely response of public health emergency.