Development and Significance of the E-surveillance System for Contact Allergies in Slovenia

This paper describes the development and significance of online systems for the collection and analysis of medical data (patch test results) with a web application. Modern digital tools greatly aid in collecting, combining, and preserving the data in a way that is friendly, undemanding and time-efficient for the dermatologist. Creating a central database for the results of patch testing provides a better picture of contact sensitivity and characteristics of allergic contact dermatitis in Slovenia. An electronic database and connected network was started in Slovenia in 2010. Data from skin allergy units since 2000 has also been included retrospectively. At present (Oct 2016), the database contains the data of 19,772 patch tests performed by seven skin allergy units. Creating a central database of the results of patch testing provides a larger and therefore more credible collection of data. Immediate integration and data processing enable a current overview of contact sensitivity for each participating center as well as at the national level. Data can be easily transferred to other databases or edited with other software tools. This on-line register has worked flawlessly for more than five years. We have contributed data to the European Surveillance System on Contact Allergies (ESSCA) network database since 2012, which, along with the Deutsche Kontaktallergie-Gruppe system of collecting patch test data for German-speaking countries, represents the only multicenter surveillance system of patch test results in Europe.