[Evaluation of the National Notification System for infectious diseases during an outbreak of Shigella epidemic in Norway 1994].

The National Notification System for Infectious Diseases, in Norwegian abbreviated to MSIS, registered 110 cases of Shigella sonnei-infection in persons with debut of symptoms during weeks 21 to 25, 1994, and where we did not receive information that the patients had been abroad. We evaluated the notification system during this outbreak of infectious disease by looking at delays in the notification process and estimating the proportion of patients who received an etiological diagnosis. It took a median time of seven days from onset of illness until a faecal specimen was obtained and a further ten days (maximum 15 days) until the result was registered in MSIS. The time lapse between receiving the specimen until MSIS had registered the result varied from six to 15 days among the laboratories which sent more than four notifications. In the summarical notification system we registered an increase of 712 cases (86%) of acute gastroenteritis compared with the same week the previous two years.