Overview of the Canadian Network for Public Health Intelligence (CNPHI)

The Canadian Network for Public Health Intelligence (CNPHI) fills a need in Canada’s national public health infostructure to gather and share strategic public health information and intelligence.
A number of widely publicized health events in past years have sparked much reflection, debate, and subsequent action relating to the state of public health surveillance in Canada. Two large waterborne outbreaks (an E. coli outbreak in Walkerton, Ontario in 2000 and a cryptosporidiosis outbreak in North Battleford, Saskatchewan in 2001), the 2003 limited SARS episode in Toronto, Ontario, fears of bioterrorism since September 2001 and more recently the H1N1 outbreak have all prompted local, Provincial/Territorial, and Federal health authorities to assess their surveillance capacities with respect to infectious diseases. 

The Canadian Network for Public Health Intelligence (CNPHI) has:

• Over 3,000 registered users
• 20+ applications/modules
• 70+ collaboration centers

CNPHI platform includes a nationally integrated real-time alerting system designed to facilitate the dissemination of strategic intelligence which provides for better coordination of public health responses. The goal of CNPHI is to reduce the occurrence of human illness by developing tools that will support the alerting and response capacities of public health stakeholders. It is developed as a web based suite of applications and resources to integrate public health information resources and expertise, and shares this information with local, regional and national health officials. CNPHI is scaleable and has the potential to expand beyond the biological community.

To date, CNPHI has successfully piloted a suite of web-based resources including a Pan-Canadian alerting system, collaboration resource centres in use by both domestic and international working groups, national disease surveillance systems, laboratory based surveillance systems for both human and animal health domains, and a pilot syndromic surveillance system. A proprietary data integration infrastructure has been developed and implemented to integrate CNPHI with existing federal, provincial, and regional public health databases and systems.

Efforts are underway to make CNPHI technology available to other federal, provincial, and territorial government departments with public health links, fostering broader intergovernmental and cross-jurisdictional integration.

Partners

Public Health Agency of Canada, Health Canada, Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Provinces and Territories (human & animal health), Regional Health Authorities

Access to CNPHI

Prospective users can apply online at www.cnphi-rcrsp.ca through the “Apply for New Account ” link located at the bottom of the log-in screen by specifying the application to which they need access. Each user needs to be sponsored through an existing program supported by CNPHI.

Office of the Chief Engineer

Dr. Shamir N Mukhi, PhD, PEng
shamir_nizar_mukhi@phac-aspc.gc.ca
204.771.4698

For further details please contact

1.866.48.CNPHI
cnphi_admin@phac-aspc.gc.ca
www.cnphi-rcrsp.ca