Subject: Important changes to surveillance data submission
From: "STIHIVHEP" <[email-masked]>
To: "lena.koenig" <[email-masked]>, "El-Khatib Ziad" <[email-masked]>, "dominique.vanbeckhoven" <[email-masked]>, "jessika.deblonde" <[email-masked]>, "Ivailo Alexiev" <[email-masked]>, "Ivva Philipova" <[email-masked]>, "nvladimirova" <[email-masked]>, "tatjana.nemeth-blazic" <[email-masked]>,Mirjana Lana Kosanović Ličina <[email-masked]>, "drelenax" <[email-masked]>, "georgiossiakallis" <[email-masked]>, "Fani Theophanous" <
Cc: "NC_CCB_Austria" <[email-masked]>, "sigrid.kiermayr" <[email-masked]>, "lena.koenig" <[email-masked]>, "Benka Bernhard" <[email-masked]>, "koen.blot" <[email-masked]>, <[email-masked]>, "Ruben Brondeel" <[email-masked]>, "yves.dupont" <[email-masked]>, "Zhivka Getsova" <[email-masked]>, "Iva Christova" <[email-masked]>, "Nikolay Bogdanov" <[email-masked]>, "tonyminkova" <[email-masked]>, "kcapak" <[email-masked]>, "bernard.kaic" <[email-masked]>, "sanja.kure
Date: Tue, 4 Feb 2025 18:01:06 +0200

Tähelepanu! Tegemist on väljastpoolt asutust saabunud kirjaga. Tundmatu 
saatja korral palume linke ja faile mitte avada.

To:         National focal points for HIV/AIDS, STI and Hepatitis B, C

                Operational contact points for Epidemiology (STIs and 
Hepatitis)

Operational contact points for Tessy and EpiPulse Cases (STIs and Hepatitis)

Cc:        National focal points for surveillance

National Coordinators

Dear Colleagues,

We are writing to inform you that data submission to Tessy will change to a 
new system, called EpiPulse Cases. This change will be done gradually for 
all diseases. This spring it will be done for hepatitis B and C as well as 
STIs (GONO, SYPH, CHLAM, LGV, CONSYPH, but not GONOAMR which will be done in 
2026).

HIV and TB will be done in 2026. Vaccine Preventable Diseases have already 
switched over to EpiPulse Cases so as needed you can also consider 
discussing with the team that submit these data as they will have experience 
of EpiPulse Cases.

Key features:

*	EpiPulse cases has been designed to handle large data volumes and will be 
cloud-based, which will make for faster processing and allow to scale up 
capacity as required. EpiPulse Cases and the underlying data warehouse are 
set up in a way that will markedly facilitate its technical maintenance and 
hence render the platform more robust also from a user perspective

*	EpiPulse Cases will offer an automated technical and epidemiological 
validation of your data directly upon upload. The epidemiological validation 
will be based on a combination of the previous TESSy-inbuilt validation 
rules, completeness checks for key variables and a comparison with 
historical data of yours to detect any unexplained aberrations. Instead of 
TESSy error and warning messages, you will receive a graphic online 
validation report, the content and format of which will be targeted at 
epidemiologists and data managers and will point you to possible data 
quality issues.

*	Some variables will change names slightly and some coded value lists will 
also change. This is to achieve harmonisation across diseases. You will get 
more information when the metadata is circulated at the end of March.

*	The overall logic and steps of reporting national surveillance data to 
ECDC remain largely the same. However, the user interface will be different 
from TESSy, and users will need to learn how to navigate a familiar workflow 
that now comes with a new look and feel.

Tentative timeline:

*	March 24th:

The final new metadata set will be circulated and National focal points for 
a 10-day review period.

*	April

Webinars / trainings to help you understand the new EpiPulse Cases system.

In connection to the trainings ECDC will also open an EpiPulse Cases 
training environment where you can practice uploading data.

*	May 26th

The switch to EpiPulse Cases is scheduled for May 25th. The week prior to 
this date, it will not be possible to submit data to ECDC as the system is 
changed and the old data from Tessy migrated and recorded to EpiPulse Cases. 
Up to this time you can still submit data using the old Tessy system and the 
old metadata. The submitted data will be migrated to the new system by ECDC.

After May 25th you can again submit data, but only through the new EpiPulse 
Cases system.

ECDC will also provide a conversion tool that will help you recode data to 
the new metadata.

We will be in touch and send you more information closer to the time, 
including when training dates are set.

In the meantime, please do not hesitate to reach out to us with any 
questions.

Kind regards,

Lina Nerlander

Principal Expert- STIs,

on behalf of the ECDC STI and hepatitis teams

European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC)Gustav III:s boulevard 40, 169 73 Solna, Sweden

Phone +46 (0)8 58 60 10 00

 <https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/> www.ecdc.europa.eu

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