On June 20, the Engelberg Center hosted a roundtable webinar, "Learnings from the Department of Veterans Affairs Active Surveillance Activities." The roundtable featured presentations from Dr. Fran Cunningham, associate chief consultant, Center for Medication Safety program manager, Outcomes Research, Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and Dr. Chester B. (Bernie) Good, associate professor of Medicine and Pharmacy, staff physician, VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System, co-director, Center for Medication Safety.

The VA has been conducting a number of activities related to active surveillance within their own databases, which contain clinically enriched data for war veterans, a population that may differ in important ways from the general population. Dr. Cunningham and Dr. Good discussed methods used and lessons learned from three of the VA’s active surveillance activities:

• Signal refinement studies conducted to evaluate safety concerns arising within the VA population.
• Conducting risk reduction and intervention assessments to enhance patient safety, prevent untoward outcomes, and assess outcomes of specific VA interventions (e.g., formulary decisions).
• Assessing and operationalizing the common data model used by the Observational Medical Outcomes Partnership (OMOP).