Medical Providers

The primary objectives of disease surveillance are:

• To determine the extent of morbidity within the community.
• To evaluate risks of transmission.
• To intervene rapidly when appropriate.

For surveillance to be effective, the reporting of communicable diseases must be timely. Delay or failure to report communicable diseases has contributed to serious consequences in the past. Reports by health care providers form the basis for monitoring communicable diseases. The information provided is crucial for interrupting transmission, recognizing and controlling outbreaks, following trends, and informing the medical community about local occurrence of communicable diseases.

State Law (California Code of Regulations, Title 17, Health and Safety Code, Section 2500; see full text below) requires health care providers to report certain diseases and conditions of public health importance to the local health department.

Many physicians are not aware of their responsibility to report these diseases and conditions. Laboratory reporting of a particular disease does not relieve the physician of this responsibility.

Patient consent is NOT needed to report cases or suspect cases, or to supply additional information requested by Public Health.

Title 17, California Code of Regulations (CCR), §2500 Reportable Diseases and Conditions* §2500. Reporting to the Local Health Authority.


• §2500(b) It shall be the duty of every health care provider, knowing of or in attendance on a case or suspected case of any of the diseases or conditions listed below, to report to the local health officer for the jurisdiction where the patient resides. Where no health care provider is in attendance, any individual having knowledge of a person who is suspected to be suffering from one of the diseases or conditions listed below may make such a report to the local health officer for the jurisdiction
 where the patient resides.
• §2500(c) The administrator of each health facility, clinic or other setting where more than one health care provider may know of a case, a suspected case or an outbreak of disease within the facility shall establish
and be responsible for administrative procedures to assure that reports are made to the local health officer.
• §2500(a)(14) "Health care provider" means a physician and surgeon, a veterinarian, a podiatrist, a nurse practitioner, a physician assistant,
 a registered nurse, a nurse midwife, a school nurse, an infection control practitioner, a medical examiner, a coroner, or a dentist.