Official Nationwide Launch of the EWARS Flipchart

　　Pertemuan Nasional SKDR or EWARS National meeting was held in Batam on June 12-13, 2024. It was a hybrid offline-online event attended by around 329 people from MOH, 38 Provincial Health Offices (PHOs) across Indonesia, Laboratories, Health Quarantine Office (BKK), and development partners such as WHO, CDC, PAEI, and Reconstra AIHSP. This year’s topic for the EWARS National meeting was: Surveilans Kuat, Indonesia Hebat or Strong Surveillance, Great Indonesia.

　　On this important occasion, JICA was honoured to introduce the EWARS flipchart on a national scale. Dr. Motoyuki TSUBOI, Chief Advisor of the JICA EWARS project, handed over the hard copy of the EWARS flipchart to Dr. Achmad Farchanny Tri Adryanto, M.K.M, Director of Surveillance and Health Quarantine, MOH and representatives from provincial health offices, marking the national launch of the EWARS flipchart as one of the surveillance tools. EWARS flipchart is targeted for clinicians and surveillance officers in EWARS reporting units such as Puskesmas, hospitals, laboratoriums, and the Health Quarantine Office, called BKK. It means that the EWARS flipchart, both softcopy and hardcopy, is expected to reach over 10,489 Puskesmas, 1386 hospitals, 92 laboratories, and 51 BKK, all of which are already registered as EWARS reporting units, and will hopefully help to strengthen the EWARS and Surveillance system in Indonesia.

　　In early 2023, JICA EWARS project collaborated with the Directorate of Surveillance and Health Quarantine, MOH, to create the EWARS flipchart, as a simple tool for clinicians to define suspect/temporary diagnoses by screening patients’ signs and symptoms and providing rapid responses to 24 infectious diseases which monitored by EWARS. Early detection and rapid response in EWARS are critical to avoiding extraordinary condition (KLB) or outbreak situations. Thus, adopting an EWARS flipchart is predicted to increase the sensitivity of case definition and response, strengthening the EWARS at the frontline level. Aside from clinicians, the EWARS flipchart was created to enhance coordination between clinicians and surveillance officers and understand EWARS, as well as to provide patients with information on the EWARS reporting mechanism and general diseases information. The EWARS flipchart includes a guideline table for case detection based on signs and symptoms, an operational definition, general information of 24 outbreak potential diseases, case treatment, a surveillance reporting method, and the equivalent of ICD-10(*1) and EWARS codes. Furthermore, the Directorate of Public Health Management, MOH, has adopted the EWARS flipchart to support the implementation of Primary Service Integration (ILP), particularly cluster 4, for infectious disease control at the Puskesmas level.

　　After one-year trial, socialization, distribution of nearly 2,200 pcs hardcopies of the EWARS flipchart in the piloting sites (Banten, East Kalimantan, and South Sulawesi), and the completion of the revision phase, JICA EWARS Project and MOH proudly presented and launched the flipchart on national scale with the hope that doctors, surveillance officers, and patients will benefit the most from its use. JICA EWARS Project and MOH are delighted with the great response and welcome other provinces, districts, and stakeholders to expand the printing and distribution.


(*1) ICD: International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems.