Visualizing Georeferenced Data: Representing Reliability of Health Statistics

1998 ◽  
Vol 30 (9) ◽  
pp. 1547-1561 ◽  
Author(s):  
A M MacEachren ◽  
C A Brewer ◽  
L W Pickle
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Method ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
Health Data ◽  
Human Vision ◽  
Health Statistics ◽  
Data Reliability ◽  
Color Characteristics ◽  
Visualization Process ◽  
Semiotic Approach ◽  
Novel Method

The power of human vision to synthesize information and recognize pattern is fundamental to the success of visualization as a scientific method. This same power can mislead investigators who use visualization to explore georeferenced data—if data reliability is not addressed directly in the visualization process. Here, we apply an integrated cognitive-semiotic approach to devise and test three methods for depicting reliability of georeferenced health data. The first method makes use of adjacent maps, one for data and one for reliability. This form of paired representation is compared to two methods in which data and reliability are spatially coincident (on a single map). A novel method for coincident visually separable depiction of data and data reliability on mortality maps (using a color fill to represent data and a texture overlay to represent reliability) is found to be effective in allowing map users to recognize unreliable data without interfering with their ability to notice clusters and characterize patterns in mortality rates. A coincident visually integral depiction (using color characteristics to represent both data and reliability) is found to inhibit perception of clusters that contain some enumeration units with unreliable data, and to make it difficult for users to consider data and reliability independently.

scholarly journals Trends in Diabetes Mortality in Urban and Rural China, 1987–2019: A Joinpoint Regression Analysis

2022 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Binbin Su ◽  
Yiran Wang ◽  
Yanhui Dong ◽  
Gang Hu ◽  
Yike Xu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Diabetes Mellitus ◽  
Mortality Rate ◽  
Rural Areas ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
Health Statistics ◽  
Joinpoint Regression ◽  
Diabetes Mortality ◽  
The Past ◽  
Joinpoint Regression Analysis

PurposeDiabetes mellitus is emerging as an epidemic worldwide, and the incidence and prevalence of diabetes have drastically changed in China over the past 30 years, but data on its mortality rate are scarce. This study aimed to analyze the time trends of mortality rates among patients with diabetes in the rural and urban population in China between 1987 and 2019.MethodsThe research data come from China’s annual report on national health statistics and the Chinese Health Statistics Yearbook. Age-standardized mortality rates were calculated by using the direct method based on the World Standard Population from the WHO. Joinpoint regression analysis was employed to estimate the annual percent change and average annual percentage changes of mortality rates of diabetes mellitus.ResultsAn overall trend for increment in diabetes mortality was observed. The crude mortality rates and age-standardized mortality rates of diabetes for urban and rural residents in China showed a significant increasing trend between 1987 and 2019. Mortality due to diabetes in urban areas has been higher than in rural areas for 30 years. However, due to the rapid increase of rural diabetes mortality in the past decade, the gap between the two gradually narrowed. The age-standardized mortality rates of diabetes increased by about 38.5% in urban areas and 254.9% in rural areas over the whole study period. In addition, the age-standardized mortality rate of females with diabetes was higher than that of males, but this pattern began to change in urban areas in 2012. Finally, the age-standardized mortality rates in the elderly population in China are higher with a faster growth rate, especially in rural areas.ConclusionThe mortality rate of diabetes is on the rise in China. The rapid growth of the mortality rate of diabetes in rural areas leads to the reduction of the urban–rural gap. Male mortality rates in urban areas have surpassed those of women. At the same time, the mortality rate of diabetes showed obvious elder-group orientation. As China’s population ages, the burden of death and disability caused by diabetes and its complications will continue to increase. These results indicate that diabetes has become a significant public health problem in China. Such an effect increases the demand for strategies aimed at the prevention and treatment of diabetes mellitus. In addition to the prevention and intervention of diabetes in high-risk groups, it is also necessary to establish diabetes screening networks to identify patients with mild symptoms. Early detection and timely intervention can effectively reduce the incidence and mortality of diabetes.

scholarly journals NO INCREASE IN RELATIVE MORTALITY RATES FOR THOSE WITHOUT A COLLEGE DEGREE DURING COVID-19: AN ANOMALY

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne Case ◽  
Angus Deaton
Keyword(s):  
Protective Effect ◽  
Sex Education ◽  
Public Transportation ◽  
Relative Risk Reduction ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
College Degree ◽  
Health Statistics ◽  
Risk Of Death ◽  
Percentage Points ◽  
Race Ethnicity

American mortality rates have diverged in recent years between those with and without a four-year college degree, and there are many reasons to expect the education-mortality gradient to have steepened during the pandemic. Those without a BA are more likely to work in frontline occupations, to rely on public transportation, and to live in crowded quarters, all of which are associated with an increase in infection risk, a risk that was zero prior to the pandemic. We use publicly available data from the National Center for Health Statistics on deaths by age, sex, education and race/ethnicity to assess the protective effect of a BA in 2020 compared to 2019. While the BA was strongly protective during 2020, the ratio of mortality rates between those with and without a degree was little changed relative to pre-pandemic years. Among 60 groups (gender by race/ethnicity by age) that are available in the data, the relative risk reduction associated with a BA fell for more than half the groups between 2019 and 2020, and increased by more than 5 percentage points for only five groups. Our main finding is not that the BA was protective against death in 2020, which has long been the case, but that the protective effect was little different than in 2019 and earlier years, in spite of the change in the pattern of risk by occupation and income. The virus maintained the mortality-education gradient that existed pre-pandemic, at least through the end of 2020. Our results suggest that changes in the risk of infection were less important in structuring mortality than changes in the risk of death conditional on infection.

Mortality Rates and Health Progress

PEDIATRICS ◽  
1988 ◽  
Vol 82 (4) ◽  
pp. 671-672
Author(s):  
MYRON E. WEGMAN
Keyword(s):  
Health Status ◽  
Infant Mortality ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
Similar Data ◽  
Health Statistics ◽  
Future Action ◽  
Health Progress ◽  
Classification Procedures ◽  
Completeness Of Reporting ◽  
General Indicator

Mortality rates, when properly interpreted, can be of much use in allowing us to follow the progress of a community's health status. Pediatricians have tended to look mainly at infant mortality, traditionally a sensitive general indicator, but similar data for other children are also of value. In this issue of Pediatrics, Hoekelman and Pless1 reviewed National Center for Health Statistics data regarding the trend, since 1900, of US mortality at the several ages of childhood, analyzing the factors that appear to have had most influence and seeking lessons for future action. Wisely, before making any interpretations, they examined carefully whether statistical factors such as completeness of reporting or changes in classification procedures might have interfered seriously with any of their conclusions and justifiably believed none did.

The Best of Both Worlds: Adaptation During Natural Tasks Produces Long-Lasting Plasticity in Perceptual Ocular Dominance

2017 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 14-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Min Bao ◽  
Bo Dong ◽  
Lijuan Liu ◽  
Stephen A. Engel ◽  
Yi Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Ocular Dominance ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Human Vision ◽  
Image Process ◽  
Natural Vision ◽  
Real Time Image ◽  
Patient Groups ◽  
Novel Method ◽  
Natural Tasks ◽  
Time Image

In human vision, one eye is usually stronger than the other. This is called ocular dominance. Extremely imbalanced ocular dominance can be found among certain patient groups, for example, in patients with amblyopia. Here, we introduce a novel method to rebalance ocular dominance. We developed an altered-reality system that subjects used to interact with the natural world, the appearance of which was changed through a real-time image process. Several daily adaptation sessions lasting 3 hr each reduced sensory ocular dominance in adults who were not diagnosed with amblyopia and improved vision in patients with amblyopia. Surprising additional strengthening was found over the subsequent 2 months, when subjects experienced natural vision only. Our method effectively trains subjects to use both eyes in the wide variety of everyday tasks. The transfer of this training to everyday vision likely produced the continuing growth in effects during the months after the training. These findings are promising for the application of this method in future clinical research on amblyopia.

scholarly journals Changes in Census Data Will Affect Our Understanding of Infant Health

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 237802312110236
Author(s):  
Alexis R. Santos-Lozada
Keyword(s):  
Infant Mortality ◽  
Infant Health ◽  
Census Data ◽  
Differential Privacy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
Census Bureau ◽  
Health Statistics ◽  
Health Dynamics ◽  
The Impact

Descriptions of the effect of the implementation of a new disclosure avoidance system (DAS), which relies on differential privacy, emphasize the impact of our understanding of contemporary social and health dynamics. However, focusing on overall population may obscure important changes in subpopulation indicators such as age-specific rates resulting from this implementation. The author provides a visualization that compares infant mortality rates calculated using 2009–2011 county-level average death counts and denominators derived from the traditional and proposed DASs. Death counts come from the National Center for Health Statistics and denominators come from the first U.S. Census Bureau demonstration products. These visualizations indicate that infant mortality rates produced using the proposed DAS are different from those produced using the traditional methods, with higher variation observed for nonmetropolitan counties and areas with smaller populations. These findings suggest that the proposed DAS will hinder our ability to understand contemporary health dynamics in the United States.

scholarly journals Rank Indices Method and its use for the comparative analysis of population health data

2019 ◽  
Vol 95 (3) ◽  
pp. 306-311
Author(s):  
A. M. Bolshakov ◽  
Vyacheslav Krutko ◽  
T. M. Smirnova ◽  
S. V. Chankov
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Mortality Rate ◽  
Life Expectancy ◽  
Calculation Method ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
Health Data ◽  
Mortality Trends ◽  
Economic Determinants ◽  
The Social

There is presented a calculation method aimed to elevate the informative value of the integral indices of the social and hygienic monitoring for purposes of comparative analysis. The method of rank indices is based on the ranking of monitoring objects on the values ofprimary indices on the base of which there are calculated the integral such indices as, for example, life expectancy. There are presented results of the use of this method for the comparative analysis of mortality rate in WHO Member States for the period of 1990-2011. There were revealed special features of mortality trends which cannot be detected when using only mortality rates or the life expectancy. In particular, for Russia there was shown that, in spite of the downward trend in child and adolescent mortality rate observed in the last decade, the country's world rankings for these indices fail to achieve the level of 1990. This means that the competitiveness of the country, sharply declined in the 90's, was not restored until now. There are described some features of the use of the method of rank indices for the analysis of indices of the environment state, public health and its socio-economic determinants.

scholarly journals Reducing Selection Bias in Analyzing Longitudinal Health Data with High Mortality Rates

2010 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 403-413 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xian Liu ◽  
Charles C. Engel ◽  
Han Kang ◽  
Kristie L. Gore
Keyword(s):  
Selection Bias ◽  
High Mortality ◽  
Mortality Rates ◽  
Health Data
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