2. Purpose and Use of GIS
¡ The Dartmouth Project uses GIS to map Medicare
data in order to analyze and highlight variations
in the distribution of healthcare in the US.
¡ The project hopes to improve the disparities in
health and the healthcare system by highlighting
these differences with an interactive interface.
3. The homepage offers an example map (Coronary Bypass Grafting
Procedures per 1,000 Medicare Enrollees, 2007) which the user can edit
by customizing the report or adjusting the layers of the map.
4. In this screenshot I have utilized the customize option to change the region
type from hospital referral region to state. The user is also able to adjust the
Year and gender.
5. The navigation bar at the top of the homepage allows the user to create there own
map. One can choose to start with 3 options: data by region, data by hospital, and
data by topic.
A search bar at the bottom of the home page also allows the user to
search for data by zip code.
6. Some of the data by topic options are listed above.
7. I chose Quality/Effective care, which generated a map of the
Percentage of Diabetic Medicare Enrollees Receiving Appropriate
Management, By Race and Type of Screening.
8. Above I chose to customize the map by changing the type of screening
from Hemoglobin A1c to a Blood Lipids Test. Based on the adjusted map,
it appears that more enrollees who receive a Blood Lipid Test are
receiving appropriate management of their Diabetes.
9. Conclusion
-The Dartmouth Atlas of Healthcare provides a very user friendly tool for
accessing analytic maps relating to Medicare data.
-The site offers a large variety of analytic maps and allows the user to
browse by region, hospital, or topic. I found the maps clear and easy to
read and the tools for customizing the map and adding/changing
layers were extremely intuitive.
-While the stated goal of the site is to “help policymakers, the media,
health care analysts and others improve their understanding of the
efficiency and effectiveness of our health care system,” the system’s
ease of use prevents it from alienating someone with a casual interest.
