Methodologic Issues and Approaches to Spatial Epidemiology

Methodologic Issues and Approaches to Spatial Epidemiology

Spatial epidemiology is increasingly being used to assess health risks associated with environmental hazards. Risk patterns tend to have both a temporal and a spatial component; thus, spatial epidemiology must combine methods from epidemiology, statistics, and geographic information science. Recent statistical advances in spatial epidemiology include the use of smoothing in risk maps to create ...

Spatial Epidemiology: Current Approaches and Future Challenges

Spatial epidemiology is the description and analysis of geographic variations in disease with respect to demographic, environmental, behavioral, socioeconomic, genetic, and infectious risk factors. We focus on small-area analyses, encompassing disease mapping, geographic correlation studies, disease clusters, and clustering. Advances in geographic information systems, statistical methodology, a...

Methodologic frontiers in environmental epidemiology.

Environmental epidemiology comprises the epidemiologic study of those environmental factors that are outside the immediate control of the individual. Exposures of interest to environmental epidemiologists include air pollution, water pollution, occupational exposure to physical and chemical agents, as well as psychosocial elements of environmental concern. The main methodologic problem in envir...

Epidemiology of disability in the oldest old: methodologic issues and preliminary findings.

Little is known about the health problems of the fastest-growing segment of the population. Three major community-based studies present prevalence information on physical and mental disabilities among the oldest old. These data also illustrate the limitations of interpretations in cross-sectional studies, and emphasize the value of prospective investigations of populations aged 85 and older. Al...

Novel methodologic approaches to phase I, II, and III trials.