System for Rapid Assessment of Pneumonia and Influenza-Related Mortality-Ohio, 2009-2010

Rapid mortality surveillance is critical for state emergency preparedness. To enhance timeliness during the 2009-2010 influenza A H1N1 pandemic, the Ohio Department of Health activated a drop-down menu within Ohio's Electronic Death Registration System for reporting of pneumonia-or influenza-related deaths approximately 5 days postmortem. We used International Classification of Diseases-Tenth Revision (ICD-10) codes, available 2-3 months postmortem as the standard, and assessed their agreement with drop-down-menu codes for pneumonia-or influenza-related deaths. Among 56 660 Ohio deaths during September 2009-March 2010, agreement was 97.9% for pneumonia (kappa = 0.85) and 99.9% for influenza (kappa = 0.79). Sensitivity was 80.2% for pneumonia and 73.9% for influenza. Drop-down menu coding enhanced timeliness while maintaining high agreement with ICD-10 codes.