[Syndromic surveillance: review and prospect of a promising concept].

Syndromic surveillance appeared in the field of public health surveillance in the late 90's. Initially proposed for public health identification of bioterrorism events, the method failed to provide convincing evidence of its usefulness and potential benefits. The definition which is proposed today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of Atlanta is the most commonly accepted. It defines syndromic surveillance as an automatic process that goes from registration to transfer of data recorded within the framework of a professional rather than public health goal. Systems operating today have integrated a public health approach through routine surveillance procedures with a broader focus than bioterrorism, implying active participation of the official public health surveillance structures. Syndromic surveillance offers several advantages including quick access to a large volume of data in real time, no extra-work for data registration and construction of a historical dataset useful as an historical baseline. Nevertheless, the limitations of this type of surveillance should not be forgotten (sometimes limited sensitivity, specificity, important technical burden…). Today, recorded experience shows that there is no opposition between syndromic surveillance and classical surveillance. On the contrary, they should be presented as complementary procedures. Syndromic surveillance should be analyzed from a temporal perspective, examining its short-term use as an alert mechanism, mid-term use for constitution of historical time series, and long-term use for a description of human health in the 21st century.