Guidelines for second generation HIV surveillance - World Health ...

Tips for developing a national surveillance plan
National surveillance plans should be developed with key stakeholders and partners involved in data
collection in the country. Key stakeholders include:
• programme managers
• monitoring and evaluation officers
• members of civil society who represent the populations being studied
• development partners who might fund the activities or who could provide technical assistance
on surveillance
• staff from the national statistics office or those who conduct the major household surveys and
censuses.
Evaluating a National Surveillance System
Including these partners will ensure that the plan answers the key questions needed by programmes,
is complementary to other data collection efforts, is realistic as well as sustainable, and allows
knowledge sharing and use of data by partners.
After looking at the inventory and epidemiological zones map, the rationale for choosing certain
surveillance activities over others should be discussed. For each surveillance activity, the surveillance
plan should cover the technical guidelines to be followed as well as the prepared protocols that were
approved by an ethics panel. This includes:
• the rationale and criteria used for selecting sites and populations with cost per site
• the roles and responsibilities of staff in surveillance administration, management, technical support
and implementation
• a timeline showing the major surveillance milestones: preparation, implementation, analysis, data
use for planning and decision-making, dissemination
• the quality assurance procedures that need to be followed
• the data collection and quality control instruments
• the standard documentation templates that will be used for collecting data
• how to address ethical conduct and data security issues
• how to standardize and yet maintain local ownership.
Think about the epidemic categories within the country
Epidemic categories are most useful when the area has a uniform epidemic pattern. The categories in
your mapping describe the general patterns of transmission dynamics of your epidemic. They guide your
country in planning appropriate responses.
In some countries or geographical areas, epidemic categories may not fully describe the underlying epidemic.
The categories are most helpful in concentrated epidemics by drawing attention to key populations at
higher risk in need of services but they are less helpful in low-level epidemics. Low-level epidemics may
be interpreted as no cause for concern, action or resource allocation when, in fact, the key message should
be the need to develop focused interventions, prioritizing areas and persons at higher risk, and vigilance in
monitoring the epidemic.
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