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New Data Source (new + data_source)
Selected AbstractsInjury Deaths of US Citizens Abroad: New Data Source, Old Travel ProblemJOURNAL OF TRAVEL MEDICINE, Issue 5 2009Daniel J Tonellato BA Candidate Background Global travel continues to increase, including among US citizens. The global burden of injuries and violence, accounting for approximately 5 million deaths worldwide in 2000, is also growing. Travelers often experience heightened risk for this biosocial disease burden. This study seeks to further describe and improve our understanding of the variable risk of travel-related injury and death. Methods Information on US civilian citizen deaths from injury while abroad was obtained from the US Department of State Web site. This information was categorized into regional and causal groupings. The groupings were compared to each other and to injury deaths among citizens in their native countries. Results From 2004 to 2006, there were 2,361 deaths of US citizens overseas due to injury. Of these US citizen injury deaths, 50.4% occurred in the Americas region. Almost 40% (37.8%) of US citizen injury deaths in the low- to middle-income Americas were due to vehicle crashes compared to about half that (18.9%) (proportional mortality ratio [PMR] = 1.72, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.59,1.62) for low- to middle-income Americas citizen injury deaths. Similar differences between US citizen injury death abroad and the in-country distributions were also found for vehicle crashes in Europe (35.9% vs 16.5%, PMR = 2.17, 95% CI 1.78,2.64; p < 0.0005), for drowning deaths in the Americas (13.1% vs 4.6%, PMR = 2.67, 95% CI 2.29,3.11) and many island nations (63.5% vs 3.5%, PMR = 11.38, 95% CI 8.17,15.84), and for homicides in the low- to middle-income European countries (16.9% vs 10.5%, PMR = 1.52, 95% CI .90,2.57). Conclusions US citizens should be aware of regional variation of injury deaths in foreign countries, especially for motor vehicle crashes, drowning, and violence. Improved knowledge of regional variations of injury death and risk for travelers can further inform travelers and the development of evidence-based prevention programs and policies. The State Department Web site is a new data source that furthers our understanding of this challenging travel-related health issue. [source] Floodplain friction parameterization in two-dimensional river flood models using vegetation heights derived from airborne scanning laser altimetryHYDROLOGICAL PROCESSES, Issue 9 2003David C. Mason Abstract Two-dimensional (2-D) hydraulic models are currently at the forefront of research into river flood inundation prediction. Airborne scanning laser altimetry is an important new data source that can provide such models with spatially distributed floodplain topography together with vegetation heights for parameterization of model friction. The paper investigates how vegetation height data can be used to realize the currently unexploited potential of 2-D flood models to specify a friction factor at each node of the finite element model mesh. The only vegetation attribute required in the estimation of floodplain node friction factors is vegetation height. Different sets of flow resistance equations are used to model channel sediment, short vegetation, and tall and intermediate vegetation. The scheme was tested in a modelling study of a flood event that occurred on the River Severn, UK, in October 1998. A synthetic aperture radar image acquired during the flood provided an observed flood extent against which to validate the predicted extent. The modelled flood extent using variable friction was found to agree with the observed extent almost everywhere within the model domain. The variable-friction model has the considerable advantage that it makes unnecessary the unphysical fitting of floodplain and channel friction factors required in the traditional approach to model calibration. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source] Hyperlink Analyses of the World Wide Web: A ReviewJOURNAL OF COMPUTER-MEDIATED COMMUNICATION, Issue 4 2003Han Woo Park We have recently witnessed the growth of hyperlink studies in the field of Internet research. Although investigations have been conducted across many disciplines and topics, their approaches can be largely divided into hyperlink network analysis (HNA) and Webometrics. This article is an extensive review of the two analytical methods, and a reflection on their application. HNA casts hyperlinks between Web sites (or Web pages) as social and communicational ties, applying standard techniques from Social Networks Analysis to this new data source. Webometrics has tended to apply much simpler techniques combined with a more in-depth investigation into the validity of hypotheses about possible interpretations of the results. We conclude that hyperlinks are a highly promising but problematic new source of data that can be mined for previously hidden patterns of information, although much care must be taken in the collection of raw data and in the interpretation of the results. In particular, link creation is an unregulated phenomenon and so it would not be sensible to assume that the meaning of hyperlinks in any given context is evident, without a systematic study of the context of link creation, and of the relationship between link counts, among other measurements. Social Networks Analysis tools and techniques form an excellent resource for hyperlink analysis, but should only be used in conjunction with improved techniques for data collection, validation and interpretation. [source] Ascertainment of birth defects: The effect on completeness of adding a new source of dataJOURNAL OF PAEDIATRICS AND CHILD HEALTH, Issue 6 2000C Bower Background: The Western Australian (WA) Birth Defects Registry aims for complete ascertainment of birth defects in WA, but the proportions of birth defects in rural areas and in Aboriginal children are lower than in metropolitan and non-Aboriginal children. The effect on ascertainment of adding data from the Rural Paediatric Service (RPS) was investigated. Method: A file of all cases of birth defects for children born 1980,1997 and recorded on the RPS database was linked to the Registry. Results: The addition of this new data source had little effect on the overall prevalence of birth defects (an increase from 5.38 to 5.41%). There was a slightly greater effect on the prevalence of birth defects in rural residents (4.67%,4.76%) and Aboriginal children (4.55,4.78%), although the prevalence for each of these groups is still less than for metropolitan residents and non-Aboriginal infants, respectively. All major categories of birth defects were represented in the new cases and, in general, their addition made little difference to the prevalence of each category. The exception was fetal alcohol syndrome, which increased from 0.13 per 1000 to 0.18 per 1000 once the 21 new cases from the RPS were added. Conclusion: Complete ascertainment of birth defects is important in developing and evaluating preventive programs, and in investigating clusters of birth defects. [source] Injury Deaths of US Citizens Abroad: New Data Source, Old Travel ProblemJOURNAL OF TRAVEL MEDICINE, Issue 5 2009Daniel J Tonellato BA Candidate Background Global travel continues to increase, including among US citizens. The global burden of injuries and violence, accounting for approximately 5 million deaths worldwide in 2000, is also growing. Travelers often experience heightened risk for this biosocial disease burden. This study seeks to further describe and improve our understanding of the variable risk of travel-related injury and death. Methods Information on US civilian citizen deaths from injury while abroad was obtained from the US Department of State Web site. This information was categorized into regional and causal groupings. The groupings were compared to each other and to injury deaths among citizens in their native countries. Results From 2004 to 2006, there were 2,361 deaths of US citizens overseas due to injury. Of these US citizen injury deaths, 50.4% occurred in the Americas region. Almost 40% (37.8%) of US citizen injury deaths in the low- to middle-income Americas were due to vehicle crashes compared to about half that (18.9%) (proportional mortality ratio [PMR] = 1.72, 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.59,1.62) for low- to middle-income Americas citizen injury deaths. Similar differences between US citizen injury death abroad and the in-country distributions were also found for vehicle crashes in Europe (35.9% vs 16.5%, PMR = 2.17, 95% CI 1.78,2.64; p < 0.0005), for drowning deaths in the Americas (13.1% vs 4.6%, PMR = 2.67, 95% CI 2.29,3.11) and many island nations (63.5% vs 3.5%, PMR = 11.38, 95% CI 8.17,15.84), and for homicides in the low- to middle-income European countries (16.9% vs 10.5%, PMR = 1.52, 95% CI .90,2.57). Conclusions US citizens should be aware of regional variation of injury deaths in foreign countries, especially for motor vehicle crashes, drowning, and violence. Improved knowledge of regional variations of injury death and risk for travelers can further inform travelers and the development of evidence-based prevention programs and policies. The State Department Web site is a new data source that furthers our understanding of this challenging travel-related health issue. [source] | ||||||||||