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Geospatial tools are used at NCI for a variety of applications, including:
- the identification and display of the geographic patterns of cancer incidence and mortality rates in the US and their change over time,
- the creation of complex databases for the study of cancer screening, diagnosis and survival at the community level,
- environmental exposure assessment through satellite imagery,
- spatial statistical models to estimate cancer incidence, prevalence and survival for every US state,
- communication of local cancer information to the public and public health professionals through interactive web-based tools,
- the identification of health disparities at the local level through the comparison of cancer outcomes across demographic subgroups, and
- development of new methods of displaying geospatial data for clear communication to the public and for examination of complex multivariate data by researchers.
In the Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS):
The Epidemiology and Genetics Research Program (EGRP) and
the Surveillance Research Program (SRP) support grant research to
use GIS in cancer research and the development of methodologies to accomplish this research. EGRP also
funded the development and maintenance of a geographic information system for
breast cancer studies on Long Island
(LI GIS). The LI GIS is available to researchers and can be used to
study other types of cancer and conditions as well.
In the Surveillance Research Program (SRP) of the
Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences:
The Statistical Research and Applications Branch (SRAB)
contributes to GIS research by developing statistical methods for the analysis, display, and web-based
communication of georeferenced cancer data. Examples of GIS work done and publications written by SRAB
can be found at
http://srab.cancer.gov/about/areas/gis_spatial.html.
The Cancer Statistics Branch (CSB)
oversees the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) program, an integrated,
comprehensive, multiple population-based reporting system of cancer registries covering
26% of the U.S. population. Cancer incidence information is provided at the state, county
and census tract level. Investigators in SEER's
Rapid Response Surveillance Studies (RRSS)
are exploring and applying GIS technology
in several areas.
In the Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics (DCEG):
The Epidemiology and Biostatistics Program (EBP) has a long history of
publishing the NCI cancer atlases.
The Occupational and Environmental Epidemiology Branch (OEEB)
has an active research program in using satellite imagery to estimate the potential
exposure to cancer-causing environmental agents by individuals living in
agricultural areas.
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