 |
The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
|
The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
Aniruddha Banerjee, MS, Neil Thomas, PhD, Haichen Dong, MS, and Sandra L Putnam, PhD. Community Health Research Group, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Suite 309, Conference Center Bldg, Knoxville, TN 37996-4133, (865) 974-4511, abanerje@utk.edu
The University of Tennessee at Knoxville’s Community Health Research Group (CHRG) has developed in-house software to produce HIT MapMaker, the interactive, web-based mapping tool on Health Information Tennessee (HIT), an innovative website (server.to/hit). It uses ESRI’s MapObjects in a Visual Basic shell for basic data and map displays at county and census tract levels. However, some limitations of this proprietary software and the need for more complex spatial queries and displays occasioned exploration of a commercial software product as a substitute or complement to HIT MapMaker. This presentation shows the preliminary results of using a commercial web-based Geographical Information Systems (GIS) software like ArcIMSTM and GeoMediaTM. These commercial software are rapidly replacing the in-house software, and they have both strengths and weaknesses as substitutes. A prototype website is presented using the enhanced features of ArcIMS. These enhancements include a uniform set of exploratory tools and standardized geographic outputs, dynamic geographic area selection, complex cartographic queries and displays, and high-resolution base map overlays that enhance decision support and foster exploratory data visualization. The problems with limited customizing capacity will be weighed against improvements in standardization and functionality and the use of a hybrid model with the best features of both will be discussed.
Learning Objectives:
Keywords: Internet Tools, Community Health Assessment
Related Web page: hitspot.utk.edu
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.