An Urban Population Health Observatory System to Support COVID-19 Pandemic Preparedness, Response, and Management: Design and Development Study

TL;DR

This paper presents the design and development of the Urban Population Health Observatory (UPHO), a web-based platform integrating social determinants of health data to support COVID-19 response and future public health crises.

Contribution

It introduces a novel blueprint and prototype for UPHO, integrating diverse data sources and classification methods to aid health policy and intervention strategies.

Findings

Generated and classified COVID-19 related social determinants of health indicators

Demonstrated UPHO prototype with use case scenarios for different users

Provides a new approach for health policy insights and intervention planning

Abstract

Background: COVID-19 is impacting people worldwide and is currently a leading cause of death in many countries. This study sought to redefine the Healthy People 2030 SDoH taxonomy to accommodate the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, we aim to provide a blueprint and implement a prototype for the Urban Population Health Observatory (UPHO), a web-based platform that integrates classified group-level SDoH indicators to individual- and aggregate-level population health data. The process of building the UPHO involves collecting and integrating data from several sources, classifying the collected data into drivers and outcomes, incorporating data science techniques for calculating measurable indicators from the raw variables, and studying the extent to which interventions are identified or developed to mitigate drivers that lead to the undesired outcomes. We generated and classified the indicators of social determinants of health, which are linked to COVID-19. To display the functionalities of the UPHO platform, we presented a prototype design to demonstrate its features. We provided a use case scenario for 4 different users. UPHO serves as an apparatus for implementing effective interventions and can be adopted as a global platform for chronic and infectious diseases. The UPHO surveillance platform provides a novel approach and novel insights into immediate and long-term health policy responses to the COVID-19 pandemic and other future public health crises. The UPHO assists public health organizations and policymakers in their efforts in reducing health disparities, achieving health equity, and improving urban population health.