Note: AIDS and HIV infections have been notifiable to EpiSurv since November 2018.

AIDS, HIV infection, syphilis, and gonorrhoea are notifiable Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) in New Zealand. Only AIDS and HIV are notified via EpiSurv. To access AIDS and HIV infection cases and eNotifications in EpiSurv, a PHU user will need to apply for access to a specific “STI section” using the PHU STI Users Application Form.

Once access is set up, the STI section of the EpiSurv site can be accessed from the ‘Where are you working?’ page, as pictured below. Click the blue STI button to enter the STI section of EpiSurv.

For information on notifying gonorrhoea and syphilis, please refer the Public Health Surveillance website ‘Surveillance of Sexually Transmitted Infections’ page.

AIDS and HIV infection

Public Health Units (PHUs) are required to report cases of HIV and AIDS in EpiSurv.

Case definitions for AIDS and HIV are available in the Ministry of Health Communicable Disease Control Manual.

HIV will be notified by EpiSurv direct eNotification from a laboratory, while AIDS will be notified by a health practitioner submitting an initial notification form to the local PHU.

Once notified, PHUs should create a case in EpiSurv. EpiSurv requires PHUs to provide an address to create a case, however case address will be unknown for STIs (for confidentiality reasons). Geocoding the case to Territorial Authority (TA) accuracy level is sufficient.

The University of Otago AIDS Epidemiology Group (AEG) are responsible for HIV/AIDS surveillance in New Zealand and have ‘read only’ access to all AIDS and HIV case report forms (CRFs) in EpiSurv.

AIDS in EpiSurv

Instructions for the notifying health practitioner and for PHUs regarding AIDS case creation in EpiSurv are provided in the AIDS Initial EpiSurv Notification form. The initial notification form must be completed by health practitioners to inform a local Medical Officer of Health of an AIDS case diagnosis.

The Public Health Unit should use the information provided by the notifying health practitioner to create a new case in EpiSurv. PHUs are not required to enter any further information after creating a case, because an AIDS questionnaire will be automatically created in REDCap for each EpiSurv case.

The AEG regularly checks EpiSurv and will send the notifying health practitioner a link to the REDCap form for their case using the contact information recorded in EpiSurv. Once the REDCap form is completed, the case classification will be updated in EpiSurv by direct mapping from the REDCap data.

HIV infection in EpiSurv

Laboratories notify HIV infections to EpiSurv using the direct laboratory eNotification system. As with other notifiable diseases, new lab results appear in the EpiSurv eNotifications List for each PHU Office.

PHUs should process these eNotifications to either create a new case or attached the result to an existing case. Note that HIV results will only be visible in the eNotification List from the “STI section” of the site. A corresponding HIV questionnaire will be automatically created in REDCap when a case is saved in EpiSurv.

The AEG regularly checks EpiSurv and will send the notifying health practitioner a link to the REDCap form for their case using the contact information recorded in EpiSurv. Once the REDCap form is completed, the case classification will be updated in EpiSurv by direct mapping from the REDCap data.