Introduction to geographic information systems (GIS) in disease control programmes
Programme
Organized by KIT and ITC in Enschede, this course brings together expertise in geographic information systems and its application for public health.
Week 1
During the first week in Enschede, participants will be familiarized with key concepts and techniques in GIS, with an emphasis on developing basic software skills. Topics include:
- Data collection
- Data storage
- Exploring data
- Data analysis
- Visualisation
Important issues are the spatial and temporal characteristics of health data, design, collection of spatial (baseline) data and visualisation.
Week 2
The second week, held at KIT in Amsterdam, provides an opportunity to apply and extend the GIS skills that have been learned in the first week. The course will address specific problems in the field of planning and evaluation of disease control programmes. Participants will work independently in small groups on case studies using source data provided. The case studies are grouped into the following areas of GIS application to disease control:
- Exploration of patterns of disease in space and time
- Epidemiological assessment and analysis of patterns
- Risk factors of disease in time and place, including risk mapping
- Assessment of accessibility and availability to diagnostic and treatment centres
- Visualization of health management information, such as programme indicators, human resources, laboratory performance indicators for monitoring and evaluation of programme performance.
The course will use ArcView/ArcGIS. Participants will obtain a one-year student license of ArcGIS (ArcView).
During the first and second week participants will be assisted in setting up a GIS based on their own data, as well as applying newly obtained GIS techniques to their data.
Learning method
Didactic methods include lectures, discussions and supervised practical exercises. In the second week of the course, participants work individually and in groups of 2-3 students on selected case studies relevant to disease control.