Mortality burden of the 2009-10 influenza pandemic in the United States: improving the timeliness of influenza severity estimates using inpatient mortality records.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Delays in the release of national vital statistics hinder timely assessment of influenza severity, especially during pandemics. Inpatient mortality records could provide timelier estimates of influenza-associated mortality.

Methods

We compiled weekly age-specific deaths for various causes from US State Inpatient Databases (1990-2010) and national vital statistics (1990-2009). We calculated influenza-attributable excess deaths by season based on Poisson regression models driven by indicators of respiratory virus activity, seasonality, and temporal trends.

Results

Extrapolations of excess mortality from inpatient data fell within 11% and 17% of vital statistics estimates for pandemic and seasonal influenza, respectively, with high year-to-year correlation (Sp

SUBMITTER: Charu V 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3674131 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature