CHOIS: enabling grid technologies for obesity surveillance and control

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Public Health Surveillance
• Childhood Obesity Research

Background:

• Childhood obesity is a significant public health concern requiring effective surveillance systems.
• Existing systems may lack comprehensive data integration and real-time risk assessment capabilities.
• The need for secure, scalable, and user-friendly platforms for managing child health data is critical.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce the Child Health and Obesity Informatics System (CHOIS) as a novel solution for child obesity surveillance.
• To describe the technological architecture and functionalities of the CHOIS system.
• To highlight the system's readiness for deployment in public health initiatives.

Main Methods:

• Development of CHOIS using open-source portal technology and a three-tiered Open Grid Services Architecture.
• Implementation of a web application with 112 data fields, including demographics, anthropometrics, and genomic information.
• Integration of automatic BMI and BMI percentile computation with obesity risk alerts.

Main Results:

• The CHOIS prototype has been successfully tested and is ready for use by the Illinois Department of Human Services (DHS).
• The system is HIPAA and FERPA compliant, ensuring data security and privacy.
• CHOIS enables efficient data collection and reporting for obesity surveillance and intervention.

Conclusions:

• CHOIS provides a secure, integrated platform for childhood obesity surveillance and data management.
• The system facilitates the identification of at-risk children, supporting targeted obesity prevention and intervention.
• Leveraging grid computing, CHOIS offers a scalable solution for public health informatics.