MPH Thesis
Model Geographic Information System (GIS) Infrastructure for Local Health Departments in Connecticut
GIS is a software system that allows integration of everyday data (e.g., that collected and used by a health department through normal operations) with spatial data. Spatial data carries with it the position of a feature on the earth's surface. So, if a health department has information about septic failures in data from permits it has issued a town, and that town's land use department has spatial data about land parcels, it would be useful for the health department to represent the septic failures on a map to analyze areas of widespread failure and to communicate that to town planning officials. There is an example here.
The key hypothesis of the thesis is that local health departments (LHDs) have need for GIS capability, and can find that capability within their jurisdictions without developing GIS expertise on their own. In order to use existing capability effectively, LHDs will need support in the form of infrastructure.
Data to test the hypothesis was collected through a literature review, a survey of Directors of Health, interviews with public health professionals, and by conducting pilot projects with seven LHDs.
The results include:
-
Given a functioning GIS capability in other agencies in the jurisdiction, and infrastructure, LHDs can use GIS for analysis and communication without developing expertise on their own
-
There is minimal leadership for GIS at the state level. There are a number of disparate, under-funded, well-intentioned efforts but that is not leadership.
-
In order to succeed with GIS, LHDs will need to build positive relationships with other agencies. These relationships require enabling policies and procedures.
The model infrastructure, which is on a CD distributed by the Connecticut Association of Directors of Health, includes a sample project plan for a GIS implementation, model processes, and guidelines, examples, templates (including the results of the pilot projects), and key findings and recommendations.
The research, including the pilot projects, was conducted in the summer and fall of 2004, and thesis was defended in January 2005.
I presented a scientific session on this research at the annual meeting of the American Public Health Association in Washington, DC in November 2004, and the work has been accepted for presentation at the ESRI International User Conference in San Diego, CA in July 2005.
See the table of contents and/or the poster for more detail.