CDC/CSTE Pertussis Case Definition
Classifies a case as confirmed, probable, or not meeting the CDC and CSTE pertussis surveillance case definition of 2020.
Open the calculator → Runs in your browser. Data leaves only if you deliberately send a problem report from the interactive tool.
Example
- Age group
- One year and older
- Duration of the cough illness, in weeks
- 3
- Paroxysms of coughing
- Yes
- Laboratory result
- No positive test
Result: probable pertussis after a 3 week cough with paroxysms and no positive test
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What the result means
- Clinical criteria
- Absent a more likely diagnosis, a cough illness of at least two weeks with paroxysms, an inspiratory whoop, post-tussive vomiting, or apnea in an infant under one year.
- Confirmed
- An acute cough illness of any duration with a positive culture; or the clinical criteria with a positive PCR; or the clinical criteria with an epidemiologic link to a laboratory-confirmed case.
- Probable
- The clinical criteria met, with neither laboratory confirmation nor an epidemiologic link.
- Not a treatment threshold
- This is a surveillance definition. Treatment and post-exposure prophylaxis are decided on clinical suspicion and do not wait for a classification.
- A negative test
- Does not move a case out of probable. Culture and PCR yield falls after three to four weeks of cough or once antibiotics have started.
- Serology
- Appears in no branch of this definition.
What you enter
- Age group
- Duration of the cough illness, in weeks
- Paroxysms of coughing
- Inspiratory whoop
- Post-tussive vomiting
- Apnea, with or without cyanosis (counts only in an infant under one year)
- A more likely diagnosis has been made
- Laboratory result
- Epidemiologic link to a laboratory-confirmed case
How this is calculated
Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists / CDC. Pertussis (Whooping Cough) (Bordetella pertussis) 2020 Case Definition. National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System. Read the source ↗
A reference and educational tool. Not medical, legal, or financial advice, and not a substitute for clinician judgment.