Designing Infectious Disease Data Submission Tool Based on User Feedback

SeroTracker, an evidence synthesis hub housed at the Centre for Health Informatics that tracks COVID-19 antibody prevalence (seroprevalence), aims to expand its surveillance capacity to create a standardized submission template where investigators can directly submit their granular, individual-level data, thus promoting timely, open-access, and collaborative health informatics. To engineer the submission tool, SeroTracker will conduct user interviews to gain crucial feedback from collaborators that would be utilizing this data, including public health agencies and public policy decision makers. Through user interviews this research will inform the building of a new submission tool. The specific objectives are to understand the challenges of infectious disease stakeholders' during the COVID-19 pandemic and to advise on the creation of a health informatics seroprevalence submission tool via SeroTracker.com, incorporating the needs of health data users into its design. Using the Braun and Clarke approach, we will conduct a thematic analysis of user interview responses. Questions will surround stakeholder needs within evidence synthesis and data infrastructure. Coding will be facilitated by Nvivo software before being reviewed and verified by a second coder. Theme generation will be discussed iteratively. Incorporating user-centric perspectives of infectious disease decision makers will lead to tool development which has extremely high potential yield to public health, and leverages investments into serosurveillance.