Welcome to MCRISP
Familiarize yourself with Michigan Child Care Related Infections Surveillance Program (MCRISP) and decide if joining the network is right for your childcare facility.
What is MCRISP?
The Michigan Child Care Related Infectious Disease Surveillance Program (MCRISP), established in Washtenaw County in 2013, is a free online illness reporting system for community child care centers (CCCs) and is the result of a collaboration between the University of Michigan and local public health authorities.
Why MCRISP?
Over two-thirds of all children in the United States will need to attend a child care center (CCC) by the time they reach six years of age. These children are at higher risk of becoming sick compared to children cared for exclusively at home, largely due to the germ-sharing behaviors of CCC attendees, naive child immune systems, and crowded environments of care facilities. Disease outbreaks also burden CCC programs with high illness rates, productivity lost due to these illnesses, and expensive environmental cleaning costs.
MCRISP enables CCC directors to report anonymous illness incident reports to the network in order to better inform the Washtenaw County Department of Public Health and Mott Children’s Hospital at the University of Michigan of emerging trends within the county. Our network currently represents more than 4,000 young children within Washtenaw county from a blend of private, university and federally supported (e.g. Head Start) child care centers.
We are dedicated to improving the health of young children and families through community-based research, innovative education, and public-health focused service to our regional child care partners.
Safe, simple reporting
MCRISP enables directors to quickly report common classroom illnesses without exposing sensitive, identifying health data.
We offer support for more than 30 common illnesses found in classrooms today, allowing CCC directors to submit accurate reports which translate directly to public health measures that ensure the safety of Washtenaw County
Illness data dashboards
MCRISP features dashboards to allow CCC directors to track trends in their own data or compare their facility’s trends against trends across the entire MCRISP network.
View real-time data pertaining to the spread of illnesses across Washtenaw County to take preventative measures and ensure the safety of children.
Alerts & access to resources
Access University of Michigan-developed resources pertaining to common illnesses for self-study or to send home with students. MCRISP resources are updated frequently to make sure CCC directors have the most up-to-date preventative measures and treatments for children in their care.
MCRISP also offers alerts via text message or email so that directors are always in the know about a new flu strain, public health crisis, or best practices to take within their classrooms.
