TITLE:
Digital Technologies for Global Disease Surveillance: A Scoping Review of Applications, Implementation Challenges, Equity, and Evidence Gaps
AUTHORS:
Amjad A. I. Dawood
KEYWORDS:
Digital Disease Surveillance, Public Health Surveillance, Artificial Intelligence, Mobile Health, Electronic Health Records, Participatory Surveillance, One Health, Interoperability, Health Equity
JOURNAL NAME:
Health,
Vol.18 No.11,
November
11,
2026
ABSTRACT: This scoping review mapped the evidence on digital technologies used in population-level disease surveillance and distinguished the findings from proposed or conceptual applications. It aimed to characterize applications, implementation contexts, reported benefits, barriers, equity implications, and evidence gaps. Using Arksey and O’Malley’s framework, methodological guidance, and PRISMA-ScR, the authors searched PubMed/MEDLINE, Scopus, Web of Science, Google Scholar, and selected gray literature. These include empirical studies, reviews, conceptual papers, implementation protocols, and relevant nonpeer-reviewed sources. Data were charted according to publication type, setting, disease area, technology, surveillance function, outcomes, barriers, and ethical/equity considerations. The manuscript’s extraction summary reports 10 sources in low- and middle-income country (LMIC) settings, nine in high-income country (HIC) settings, and three with global or multicountry scope; these geographical counts require reconciliation with the source-level extraction table before publication because several entries are labelled “global” or span multiple countries. Fifteen sources were reported as addressing infectious diseases, five chronic/non-communicable diseases, and two other surveillance areas; these disease-focus classifications should also be checked against the source-level records. Artificial intelligence/machine learning, participatory or social-media surveillance, and integrated/One Health platforms each appeared in five sources; mHealth appeared in four and EHR-based approaches in three. The review concluded that digital technologies may strengthen disease surveillance, but technological feasibility should not be equated with sustained public health effectiveness. Implementation depends on infrastructure, interoperability, workforce capacity, financing, governance, community trust, and equity. The included sources provide limited comparable quantitative evidence on effectiveness, economic value, subgroup coverage, or long-term outcomes. Future studies should prioritize real-world validation, implementation science, cost-effectiveness, interoperability, ethical governance, and longitudinal evaluation.