Challenge

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is required by law to collect ART surveillance data from all U.S. medical facilities performing ART procedures (ART clinics) and publish an annual ART success rates report. The CDC wished to develop a national system that would be available for the approximately 500 U.S. ART clinics to report relevant treatment and outcome details for each ART procedure performed. Annually, these reported data are used by the CDC to publish ART success rates and national trends for the public as congressionally mandated.

Solution

In 2004, Westat was awarded the CDC contract to design, program, and support the National ART Surveillance System (NASS), a secure data collection website. NASS enables ART clinics to report mandatory patient fertility history, ART treatment details, and outcomes for all ART procedures performed each year. Through 4 contracts with the CDC since 2004, Westat continues to maintain NASS, provide technical assistance to clinics reporting NASS data, prepare annual datasets for the CDC, and track ART clinics required to report to the CDC. Annually, Westat also validates a sample of the data for the CDC and has assisted with the production of the annual CDC success rates report.

Results

Currently, there are about 500 U.S. ART clinics in operation that are required to report to the CDC. In recent years, data from more than 300,000 ART procedures have been reported annually through NASS. The CDC uses these surveillance data to publish annual ART success rates reports for consumers and health professionals.