ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH
The RSA Tower, 201 Monroe Street, P.O. Box 303017, Montgomery, AL  36130-3017
(334) 206-5300 • FAX (334) 206-5520  Web Site: alabamapublichealth.gov

An Alabama laboratory submits backlog of a large number of COVID-19 results reported on the dashboard on Wednesday (October 27th).

The Alabama Department of Public Health is loading results from a large laboratory that has not previously reported COVID-19 results to the ADPH.  Over the next two cycles of data entry, a large number of cases may be added to the existing Data and Surveillance Dashboard.  Some of those cases will be from previous months.

For information related to when a case occurred versus when the case was reported simply view TAB 5.  COVID-19 is a notifiable disease and laboratories are mandatory reporters.

The ADPH does NOT have control over when results are reported.  In addition, the ADPH receives reports of COVID-19 through its Report Card – as well as the Alabama NEDSS Base System (ALNBS).  When some entities enter the facility name by free text, the system may not pick up the name if there are hyphens or other characters that do not match.  When the system does not recognize the name to match to the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA), the report is rejected.

CLIA is a required field for the laboratory report to be added to the system, and counted as a case.  ADPH Information Technology is reprocessing some data to ensure the accuracy of reporting of cases.

This reprocessing could result in additional cases added to the case count.

For information related to when a case occurred versus when the case was reported, please view TAB 5.