Cross-Jurisdictional Data Sharing: Utilization of the ATra Black Box for Deduplicating Cases in the National HIV Surveillance System (Preprint)

BACKGROUND As the use of HIV surveillance data becomes a more integral part of national care indicators and ongoing patient engagement strategies, accurate, complete, and timely data are crucial. The ATraTM Black Box is an electronic privacy-assuring system developed by Georgetown University (GU) which allows for the secure and streamlined exchange of data between public health jurisdictions. OBJECTIVE In 2018, GU was awarded a 5-year grant from CDC, PS18-1805 (1805), to de-duplicate persons across HIV surveillance jurisdictions. This paper outlines the processes GU undertook to engage public health jurisdictions and provides results of the Black Box matching sessions through the end of 2023. METHODS GU recruited jurisdictions for participation in the project and developed communication plans and documentation to assist jurisdictions with participating in quarterly matching sessions of the Black Box. GU surveyed jurisdictions to determine technical assistance needs and satisfaction with the project and held virtual and in-person meetings. RESULTS As of October 2023, GU had enrolled 40 public health jurisdictions into 1805 with signed data sharing agreements, and 75% of persons living with diagnosed HIV (PLWDH) in the US reside in these jurisdictions. Through the end of 2023, GU has conducted 21 quarterly matching sessions of the Black Box, processing over 2.1M records in the November 2023 session. CONCLUSIONS The implementation of the Black Box for sharing HIV surveillance data across jurisdictions has resulted in decreased staff time needed to update information on PLWDH. This project has improved the quality of key HIV surveillance data that are needed to measure progress on key HIV indicators at the local and national level.