On Friday, April 27, 2012, join Feeding America in Washington, D.C. as we unveil"Map the Meal Gap 2012", the second annual research study that provides estimates of food insecurity at the county and congressional district level. Food insecurity is the U.S. Department of Agriculture's measure of lack of access, at times, to enough food for an active, healthy lifestyle for all household members. This study was supported by the Howard G. Buffett Foundation and The Nielsen Company. ...
A summary of the findings, an interactive map of the United States, and the full report will be available at www.feedingamerica.org/mapthegap on Friday, April 27, 2012.
- press release
The BBC offers a world map of where you are most likely to die by different factors - shark attacks, falling off ladders, etc. The text is clear: "... it shows you the country with the highest proportion of deaths per million people for a specific type of accident, illness or other cause." I'm not sure how valuable it is, but the data is available (via PDF!) for download.
- BBC
Maps.com has published the very first ebook format title for Geographer Dr. Neal Lineback. The ebook, currently available via the Maps.com store and online book marketplace Lulu.com, draws on a specially selected collection of articles from the successful Geography in the News™ (GITN) series of weekly current events stories.
- press release
If you think Square, the hardware/software add-on for cell phones to take payment via credit card is cool, consider the implications of an add-on that will read blood samples, return positive or negative results for different diseases and send into and map results. It's in development at UCLA.
In the journal Lab on a Chip, the team of engineers describes the device as an RDT-reader attachment that clips onto a cell phone (they used iPhones and Android-based smartphones). At 65 grams, the attachment consists of an inexpensive lens, two AAA batteries, and three LED arrays.
The researchers say the attachment can read almost every type of RDT available; all the user does is insert the RDT strip into the attachment, which is then converted into a digital image via the phone's built-in camera.
An app then determines two things: whether the digital RTD is valid and whether the results are positive or negative. But the team didn't stop there. They have the reader transmit these results wirelessly to a server for processing, storage, and mapping via Google Maps to track the spread of specific conditions and diseases globally over time.
- C|net (includes video)
by Adena Schutzberg on 05/01 at 03:00 AM |
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April 25 is World Malaria Day. What' new?
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has a new initiative in combating malaria called ‘T3: Test, Treat, Track’, which urges malaria-endemic countries and donors to “move towards universal access to diagnostic testing and antimalarial treatment, and to build robust malaria surveillance systems.”
Surveillance via tracking and mapping should mean more use of GIS to fight the disease.
- Africa Business Review
Not news to me, but I guess someone had to write it down:
The developed application shows that by using solely Open Source software it was possible to develop a customisable web based GIS application that provides functions necessary to convey health and environmental data to experts and non-experts alike without the requirement of proprietary software.
- International Journal of Health Geographics
Ireland is looking for contractor for its online health atlas.
The HSE is seeking to set up a framework agreement for the development of its Health Intelligence Ireland system, a web application portal supporting health service planning and monitoring — including the National Quality Assurance Information System (NQAIS) and a health system ‘service directory’, Irish Medical Times reports.
The Executive has changed the name of its award-winning Health Atlas Ireland to the Health Intelligence Ireland system. It is an open-source mapping, database and statistical system, integrating GIS, database and statistical components with a user-friendly interface that supports web-enabled access across the Irish health sector and collaborating agencies.
- Irish Medical Times (i had to say I was a health professional to read it. I lied.)
by Adena Schutzberg on 04/26 at 03:25 AM |
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Parathyroid Surgeons at the Norman Parathyroid Center announced today that they have just exceeded 18,000 patients on their "Parathyroid Surgery Map", documenting where their patients live who had parathyroid surgery at their center. The map is generated via Google Maps and shows how far patients travel to undergo surgery at the world's leading parathyroid surgery center. The map can be seen at: http://www.parathyroid.com/Parathyroid-Surgeon-Map.htm
Marketing at its finest!
- press release
The Kaiser Family Foundation has put together a state by state map of the distribution of federal health reform dollars.
via WaPo
The Minnesota Department of Health has announced new interactive maps online to help public health professionals and others compare county and state cancer rates.
- Duluth News Tribune
by Adena Schutzberg on 04/16 at 03:00 AM |
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AdAge asks and answers:
Where do people get sick? We worked with GfKMRI to see how the Patchwork Nation county types skew in terms of prevalence of major illnesses.
You can look at the map (and some demographics from GFKMRI) and/or download the data for your own use. You can also read about actual people to better understand the stats.
- AdAge
BeWellUSC offers an interactive wellness map that allows students to find places on campus that promote physical and spiritual wellness.
- Daily Trojan
The Guardian looks about an agreement with the Ordnance Survey to access and use its data is helping medical groups in the UK better serve the population.
Health organisations are increasingly turning to mapping to visualise and plan service provision. More than two thirds of PCTs, all ambulance trusts and 69 hospital trusts in England and Wales have registered for the Public Sector Mapping Agreement (PSMA), which widens access to Ordnance Survey (OS) digital mapping products.
- The Guardian
by Adena Schutzberg on 04/12 at 03:44 AM |
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The Center for Disease Control's "Million Hearts" campaign is to reduce incidents of heart disease and stroke over five years. Five local health departments are mapping indidents to develop intervention strategies.
Washington County and Hennepin County MN, Boston, Mass.; Cambridge, Mass. and Rockland, N.Y. are all participating.
- TwinCities.com
The prototype of a Web-based application, which helps online tracking of communicable diseases such as swine flu and dengue at the level of primary health centres (PHCs) and provides the analytics to evolve emergency response and long-term epidemiological strategy, will be launched this month in Tiruvallur.
The GIS application developed by a team at the unit of Environmental Health and Biotechnology, Loyola College, provides field staff and clinicians unique IDs and passwords for reporting disease using smart phones, basic mobiles or internet-enabled computers.
To which I respond: which Loyola and what GIS system? I confirmed Loyola in Chennai. (Hindu, 2011). I could not find anything on the technology, but my guess is it's Ushahidi.
- The Hindu
Location is the key theme of a special issue of in a special theme issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
Each of the six studies uses the latest concepts and methods in geographic information systems (GIS)-based research to determine how the geographic location affects physical health. A study titled "Spatial Classification of Youth Physical Activity Patterns" shows, for example, that while rural youth get the largest proportion of their physical activity while at school, urban and suburban youth are most active when commuting. Not only does this finding suggest that the walk to school might be just as important to some children's health as is the physical education they receive as part of the school curriculum, it is also important given that adolescent health behaviors are predictive of behaviors in adults.
One of the commentaries on the topic notes that GIS is not a panacea and it's still early in its use.
- press release
- SciAm Blog
by Adena Schutzberg on 04/10 at 01:53 AM |
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