Emerg Infect Dis. 2022 Mar;28(3):564-571. doi: 10.3201/eid2803.210267.
We report on local nowcasting (short-term forecasting) of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) hospitalizations based on syndromic (symptom) data recorded in regular healthcare routines in Östergötland County (population ≈465,000), Sweden, early in the pandemic, when broad laboratory testing was unavailable. Daily nowcasts were supplied to the local healthcare management based on analyses of the time lag between telenursing calls with the chief complaints (cough by adult or fever by adult) and COVID-19 hospitalization. The complaint cough by adult showed satisfactory performance (Pearson correlation coefficient r>0.80; mean absolute percentage error <20%) in nowcasting the incidence of daily COVID-19 hospitalizations 14 days in advance until the incidence decreased to <1.5/100,000 population, whereas the corresponding performance for fever by adult was unsatisfactory. Our results support local nowcasting of hospitalizations on the basis of symptom data recorded in routine healthcare during the initial stage of a pandemic.
我们报告了基于冠状病毒病（COVID-19）住院症状数据的局部短期预测（nowcasting），这些数据是在大流行早期瑞典厄斯特哥特兰县（人口约 465000）常规医疗保健中记录的，当时广泛的实验室检测不可用。根据电话问诊中主要症状（成人咳嗽或成人发热）与 COVID-19 住院之间的时间滞后分析，为当地医疗保健管理提供了每日预测。成人咳嗽症状在预测 14 天内每日 COVID-19 住院的发病率方面表现良好（Pearson 相关系数 r>0.80；平均绝对百分比误差 <20%），直到发病率降至<1.5/100000 人口，而成人发热的相应表现则不理想。我们的结果支持在大流行初期基于常规医疗保健中记录的症状数据进行局部住院预测。
