Developing Health Geographic Information Systems (HGIS) for Khorasan Province in Iran (Technical Report)

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Developing Health Geographic Information Systems
(HGIS) for Khorasan Province in Iran (Technical
Report)
S.H. Sanaei-Nejad, (MSc, PhD) Ferdowsi University
of Mashhad, Iran, Sanaei_h_at_yahoo.co.uk www.um.ac.
ir/sanaei H.A.Faraji Sabokbar, (PhD) Tehran
University, Iran, Faraji1382_at_yahoo.com
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The essential components of a GIS

• Data acquisition,
• Preprocessing,
• Data management,
• Data manipulation and analysis and
• Product generation (Oranga, 1995).

Based on the above components, GIS can be used
to investigate questions about location,
condition, trends, routing and patterns of
attributes.
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The above characteristics of GIS make it
essential for the health service and
management. Because the health service facility,
immunization, demographic, health personnel,
hydrological system, and improved water supply
facility databases have different geographically
defined information. (Savigny, et. al., 1995).
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In Iran
Traditionally, health databases are used as
feature attribute data without considering
spatial dependency. In this project GIS was
considered to use maps, which are prepared for
health subjects and correlated to the different
available databases.
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Three options to use GIS for health
management Desktop GIS by which, maps and
attribute data are used by implementing of a
properly software. This system can be used
individually by a manager or by one person or by
a group of staff by installation the GIS in their
personal computer. Workstation GIS, by which
maps and t attribute data are stored in a server
computer and users are able to use a software map
and data processing by their PC Via a Local
Network. Enterprise Web based GIS, which can be
established to coordinate the system more
efficiently by using World Wide Web as a platform
to access the map and related attribute data
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System Architecture of the K-HGIS plan
The main structure of the K-HGIS is a Content
Management Systems (CMS) to construct network
accessibility to the health databases and also
to the maps and related attribute data.
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• Some benefits of web based CMS applications
• Allows non-technical users to easily update the
  web
• Ensuring that users not gain access to secure
  areas
• Monitoring updates prior to publishing
• Remaining up to date for the web content
• Allowing users to customize viewing contents
  with their own favorite
• Presenting the web in the local language
• Ability to add your plugging to the system when
  needed, and the system will detect and enables
  them automatically

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In the CMS, there are three main branches that we
worked on them

• Spatial data preparing
• Feature attribute data preparing
• processing and management and spatially relating
  of the feature attribute databases.

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The CMS details, which have used for K-HGIS
Portal System Theme support Customizable
view Multiple language support
Database Management System Database
connections Database queries XML convert
Security Control System Session management Log
file management Page access controls
Document Management System Archive
documents Search documents Report document
User Management System User management Group
management Page access controls
Report Management System Reporting with different
views Exporting reports to custom file types
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Map preparing and difficulties

• Preparing thematic maps and related attribute
  data is the main problem in establishing
  enterprise GIS. This is more difficult task in
  developing countries and become more problematic
  when the enterprise GIS is for health service and
  management.
• Maps and spatial data sources, traditionally, are
  not used in this section.
• There are limited map sources available in other
  governmental organization that can be used as
  basically thematic maps for HGIS, in Khorasan
  province.
• Some other maps should have been prepared by
  fieldwork using GPS and also address matching
  procedure.

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Time Cost
CAD Overlay
Digital camera
Arc View
Scanner
Software
Hardware
Arc Info
Digitizer
R2V
GPS
...
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Digitizing procedure for producing maps for K-HGIS
The first control
The original paper maps, which are available
The maps to be prepared originally
Digital maps
Base maps
Health thematic maps
Paper maps
Hospitals Health centers General patients
centers Pharmacy drugstores Local health
services Radio-trophy centers .
Availablality Scale Quality Producing time The
owner Map information Data format .
Topographic maps River Drianage Rural
points Urban area Roads Administration maps .
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Digitizing procedure for producing maps for K-HGIS
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Collecting the available maps
Investigating into digital methods
Digitizing methods
Selecting the most convenience method
Scanning the paper maps
Final map ediGeographic coordinate of the gridt
Scanning the paper maps
Producing the reference grid
The first editing to omit back ground
Projection
Transforming of the reference codes
Text correction
Filtering
Coordinate conversion
Converting to binary codes
Vectorizing
Saving
Final control and saving
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The structure of traditional databases in the
health service and management of Khorasan were
analyzed. The analyses showed that the number of
fields in the data bases are very high, which
organized into different relational tables, but
the architecture of the data bases are very
simple.
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The structure of traditional databases in the
health service and management of Khorasan were
analyzed. The analyses showed that the number of
fields in the data bases are very high, which
organized into different relational tables, but
the architecture of the data bases are very
simple.
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This traditional databases are static and update
procedure is time consuming and also
bureaucratically complicate. The new database
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Designing the web map service
We used some open sources software and developed
it according to the K-HGIS needs. The software
appropriately meets the needs and is ready to
install in the server. It is well developed to
support native languages and also the related
feature attribute data.
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Several tools are designed to access the health
service maps and also the related data. zoom in,
zoom out, pan, layer management, multi layer map,
scaling up and down, positioning and coordinate
and search tools to make the software more useful
for user via WWW.
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Thank you