Building Enhanced Public Health Data Systems With a Situational Awareness and Learning Tool: Focus Group Study

Situational awareness is the accurate and timely perception of factors in the environment, comprehension of their meanings, and projection of their future states.

We aimed to develop a cloud-based Situational Awareness and Learning Tool (SALT) that generates near-real-time analytic content from multimodal health care, government, community, and environmental data, enabling public health and hospital professionals to make informed decisions during complex population health challenges.

Several focus groups were conducted with representatives from local health departments, hospitals, and emergency agencies. The first round identified data needs and requirements to inform SALT's design. SALT was developed as a secure, cloud-based platform featuring automated deployment, role-based access, and version-controlled content publishing. The second round of focus groups evaluated the SALT prototype's utility and gathered feedback for improvements.

Participants highlighted the need for integrated data from multiple sources, tailored dashboards for specific audiences, and legal frameworks to guide timely data sharing. SALT met these requirements by providing interactive visuals, secure access levels, and a collaborative content management system. The second focus groups affirmed SALT's effectiveness in enhancing decision-making and strategic planning, suggesting enhancements such as clearer data labeling, expanded data coverage, and forecasting capabilities.

SALT addresses limitations exposed by the COVID-19 pandemic in public health data systems by offering a scalable platform for data sharing, rapid analysis, and situational awareness. It fulfills user needs for integrated, timely data, and customized analytic products. SALT represents a viable solution for enhancing public health data systems in preparation for future pandemics and other complex, multisector population health challenges.