USING A GIS TO DESIGN A CANCER EPIDEMIOLOGY STUDY

描述（申请人的描述）拟议项目的目标是 一种新的设计流行病学研究的技术， 聚集的罕见暴露和/或患病率。 通常，研究罕见的 暴露和/或罕见疾病确定了具有特定暴露的队列 并使用随访或嵌套病例对照方法。 用于空间 聚集的、罕见的暴露，例如接近点源或小面积源 (e.g.,危险废物场所、工厂）和线源（例如，功率 道路、河流），这可能非常困难。 在这个项目中， 我们将确定是否可以使用地理信息系统（GIS） 有效地定义这样一个人口，估计人口的 人口统计学并量化其暴露程度。 为了显示这些方法的实用性， 我们将采用质量保证和验证程序。 结果 这些程序应该使其他研究人员能够评估 这些和类似的数据和方法为自己的调查。 鉴于 许多研究人员不愿意使用新的、未经测试的和无效的 我们认为，这些努力有可能提供实质性的 鼓励在癌症流行病学中使用新的GIS工具。 最后， 我们会利用这些结果进行初步的生态研究。 我们将调查的实质性公共卫生问题是 住宅暴露于来自头顶的磁场之间的关联 高压输电线路和 儿童白血病。 以前的研究调查了 暴露于观察到的暴露范围的低端。 通过使用 为了丰富研究人群中暴露程度较高的受试者，我们 预期增加暴露梯度，导致效应量增加 增加了统计力量。 这项拟议研究的主要优点是，它将发展和 验证新的计算机化识别方法， 用于流行病学调查的人群特征。 这些 这些方法将比传统的现场方法更具成本效益， 评估将使用现有的数据库， 人口分布在更大的地理区域。 我们相信我们的研究 成功的可能性很高，因为大部分方法都是 在试点的基础上开发和测试，虽然从试点推广 要达到全尺寸，可能需要进行大量的修改。

DESCRIPTION (Applicant's Description) The goal of the proposed project is to pilot test a new technique for designing epidemiologic studies of spatially clustered rare exposures and/or rate diseases. Typically, studies of rare exposures and/or rare diseases identify a cohort with a specific exposure and either use a follow up or a nested case-control approach. For spatially clustered, rare exposures, such as proximity to point or small area sources (e.g., hazardous waste sites, factories) and line sources (e.g., power lines, roadways, rivers), this can be extremely difficult. In this project, we will determine if a Geographic Information System (GIS) can be used effectively to define such a population, estimate the population's demographics and quantify its exposure. To show the utility of the methods, we will apply quality assurance and validation procedures. Results from these procedures should enable other researchers to assess the adequacy of these and similar data and methods for their own investigations. Given the reluctance of many researchers to use new, untested and invalidated methodology, we view these efforts as potentially providing substantial encouragement for the use of new GIS tools in cancer epidemiology. Finally, we will use the results to conduct a preliminary ecologic study. The substantive public health question we will investigate is the reported association between residential exposure to magnetic fields from overhead high voltage electric power transmission lines and the incidence of childhood leukemia. Previous studies have investigated populations with exposures toward the low end of the observed range of exposures. By using the GIS to enrich the study population with heavily exposed subjects, we expect to increase the exposure gradient leading to increased effect sizes and increased statistical power. The main strength of this proposed study is that it will develop and validate new computerized methods for the identification and characterization of populations for epidemiologic investigations. These methods will be far more cost effective than traditional, in-the-field assessments in that then will use existing databases encompassing populations over a much larger geographic region. We believe that our study has a high likelihood of success because much of the methodology has been developed and tested on a pilot basis, although generalizations from pilot to full scale will likely require substantial modifications.