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The Utah Department of Health Partners with Biospatial

May 10, 2019

The Utah Department of Health (UDOH) has completed Data Use and Analytic agreements to become the eighteenth state to partner with Biospatial, Inc. Biospatial uses emergency medical services (EMS) and health-related data sources to provide timely, national-scale syndromic detection, monitor real-time trends, and alert to syndromic anomalies critical to the nation’s health and safety. The UDOH will submit National EMS Information System (NEMSIS) data elements to the Biospatial platform to assist in national preparedness and enhance Utah’s ability to visualize their data with other data layers of relevance.

Guy Dansie, Utah’s EMS director, is excited about the partnership and says incorporating EMS data in analyzing problems in their public health system enhances the ability to make corrections and improvements for prevention resulting in better health outcomes. He states, “We can target resources and change practices for the better when we have a clear data picture of what is happening in society. We believe that agreements with Biospatial will help provide usable data for many of Utah’s health issues.”

Biospatial develops partnerships with state and local data owners to bring health-related data into the Biospatial platform; in turn, Biospatial provides data owners access to data visualization tools, syndromic surveillance and alerting, summary dashboards, and clinical and operational reporting at no cost. Users at local, state, regional, and national levels use the Biospatial Platform tools to support near real-time biosurveillance, preparedness and response, syndromic and opioid surveillance, and automotive safety missions.

Biospatial is working closely with the National Association of State EMS Officials (NASEMSO) to connect with state EMS offices. NASEMSO has partnered with Biospatial because of the value the analytics can provide to the NEMSIS data that state EMS offices collect. Biospatial has created a pathway to contribute to state-specific surveillance and offer real-time value to state epidemiologists and state health officers.

NASEMSO Contact: Dia Gainor at dia@nasemso.org or 208-861-4841

State EMS Offices that are interested in participating with Biospatial should contact Joe Ferrell at joe.ferrell@biospatial.io or 515-291-2550.