Widespread adoption of electronic laboratory reporting has been instrumental in increasing reporting speed and state responses to disease outbreaks, according to data published in the Sept. 26 issue of the Centers for Disease Control's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report.
Since 2012, CDC has funded health departments on many administrative levels putting ELR in place. The number of health departments with ELR has doubled since 2005, according to a news release.
Promoting the use of ELR is part of the CDC's initiative to help state and local health departments recognize and respond to infectious disease, which also includes funding for advanced molecular detection, a technology for rapidly identifying infectious agents to improve the national disease-monitoring capacity.
The CDC expects ELR use to increase next month, when it will be required for hospitals to receive certain incentive payments. Currently, 25 percent of U.S. labs use ELR, according to the news release.
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