For much of 2014, the Ebola outbreak in Sub-Saharan Africa dominated headlines as the virus spread and eventually made its way to the United States and Europe. Unfortunately, while the world focused on graphic images of people dying from Ebola on the street, little attention was paid to other infectious diseases that continue to plague much of the developing world.
As media coverage of the Ebola outbreak slowly started to decline, however, news of a new strain of drug-resistant malaria started to catch the public’s attention. Drug-resistance is a silent but serious threat to public health. And, if drug-resistant malaria were to spread from its current location in Myanmar to the nearby nations of India and China, it could easily become the world’s next big global health emergency.
More generally, every year millions of people die from malaria, tuberculosis, and HIV/AIDs – aptly named neglected diseases. This fact invites the following questions: What efforts to combat these neglected diseases are working? Where is help still needed? And, what initiatives are actually making a difference?
A new Global Health Impact index, supported by a collaboration of university-based researchers and civil society organizations around the world, helps provide answers to these questions. The index evaluates the global health impact of particular drugs. This information can be used to increase awareness about particular diseases, and create national and international demand for drugs to treat these diseases.
A drug’s global health impact is determined by compiling information about: (1) the need for the drug; (2) access to the drug; and (3) effectiveness of the drug. In this way, the Global Health Impact index makes it possible to estimate the impact of each drug in each country, as well as the global impact of particular drugs on specific diseases such as malaria, tuberculosis and HIV/AIDS.
…
Finding and Using Health Statistics : A Tutorial
Finding and using health statistics has become requisite for a number of careers in the past several decades. It’s also a worthwhile skill for anyone navigating the increasingly complex world of health care and medicine. This free online course from the U.S. National Library of Medicine is divided into three related parts: About Health Statistics, Finding Health Statistics, and Supporting Material. Selecting any of these tabs opens to a table of contents. From there, readers can follow the course page by page. For instance, About Health Statistics begins by reviewing the importance of health stats, moves on to their uses, and then speaks about sources for the gathering of statistics, such as population surveys and registers of diseases.
Copyright © 2013 Internet Scout Research Group – http://scout.wisc.edu
Related Resources
- Health Stastistics – links to great starting places (Health Resources for All, edited by Janice Flahiff)
- Locating Health Statistics – a University of Toledo Library Guide
[Online tool] Community Health Status Indicators (CHSI) Website Launch
From the 12 March 2015 press release
CDC has released the updated Community Health Status Indicators (CHSI) online tool that produces public health profiles for all 3,143 counties in the United States. Each profile includes key indicators of health outcomes, which describes the population health status of a county and factors that have the potential to influence health outcomes, such as health care access and quality, health behaviors, social factors, and the physical environment.
Each profile includes key indicators of health outcomes, which describes the population health status of a county and factors that have the potential to influence health outcomes, such as health care access and quality, health behaviors, social factors, and the physical environment.
The re-designed online application includes updated peer county groups, health status indicators, a summary comparison page, and U.S. Census tract data and indicators for sub-populations (age groups, sex, and race/ethnicity) to identify potential health disparities. In this new version of CHSI, all indicators are benchmarked against those of peer counties, the median of all U.S. counties, and Healthy People 2020 targets. Organizations conducting community health assessments can use CHSI data to:
- Assess community health status and identify disparities;
- Promote a shared understanding of the wide range of factors that can influence health; and
- Mobilize multi-sector partnerships to work together to improve population health.
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[Reblog] The Global Health Impact Index
From the 30 January 2015 post by Nicole Hassoun and Priya Bhimani at Impact Ethics
Partners in Information Access for the Public Health Workforce – Great site to learn and keep updated about issues afffecting all
Keeps you informed about news in public health, upcoming meetings, and new public health online resources
Partners in Information Access for the Public Health Workforce is a collaboration of U.S. government agencies, public health organizations and health sciences libraries. This comprehensive collection of online public health resources includes the following topic pages. Each has links to news items; links to relevant agencies, associations, and subtopics; literature and reports; data tools and statistics; grants and funding; education and training; conferences and meetings; jobs and careers; and more
Main Topic pages include material on
- Health Promotion and Health Education -news and resources
- Health Data Tools and Statistics- links to international, national, state, county and local data resources
- Grants and Funding
- Education and Training -many free and online
- Conferences and Meetings
- Finding People – directories of people and organizations in public health.
- Discussion and E-mail Lists
- Jobs and Careers
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[Free Statistics Book] Know Your Chances – NCBI Bookshelf
Ever been scared or made uncomfortable about threats to your health? And solutions that seemed too good to be true?
Here’s a book for just about everyone that can help one understand the statistics behind health information. And how to spot misinformation easily.
What This Book is About – Know Your Chances – NCBI Bookshelf.
From the intro
Every day we are faced with news stories, ads, and public service announcements that describe health threats and suggest ways we can protect ourselves. It’s impossible to watch television, open a magazine, read a newspaper, or go online without being bombarded by messages about the dangers we face.
Many of the messages are intended to be scary, warning us that we are surrounded by danger and hinting that everything we do or neglect to do brings us one step closer to cancer, heart disease, and death. Other messages are intended to be full of hope, reassuring us that technological miracles and breakthrough drugs can save us all. And many messages do both: they use fear to make us feel vulnerable and then provide some hope by telling us what we can do (or buy) to lower our risk. In addition, as you may suspect, a great many of these messages are wildly exaggerated: many of the risks we hear about are really not so big, and the benefits of many of the miraculous breakthroughs are often pretty small.
As a result, we are often left misinformed and confused. But it doesn’t have to be that way.
The goal of this book is to help you better understand health information by teaching you about the numbers behind the messages—the medical statistics on which the claims are based. The book will also familiarize you with risk charts, which are designed to help you put your health concerns in perspective. By learning to understand the numbers and knowing what questions to ask, you’ll be able to see through the hype and find the credible information—if any—that remains.
Don’t worry: this is not a math book (only a few simple calculations are required). Instead, this is a book that will teach you what numbers to look for in health messages and how to tell when the medical statistics don’t support the message. This book will help you develop the basic skills you need to become a better consumer of health messages, and these skills will foster better communication between you and your doctor.
From the book (pages 130-132)
CREDIBLE SOURCES OF HEALTH STATISTICS
Sources Created Primarily for Consumers BMJ (British Medical Journal) Best Treatments
http://besttreatments.bmj.com/btuk/home.jsp
Medical publishing division of the British Medical Association (no commercial ads allowed). Rates the science supporting the use of operations, tests, and treatments for a variety of conditions. In the United States and Canada, available only with a Consumer Reportssubscription.
Center for Medical Consumers
Independent, nonprofit organization. Offers a skeptical take on health claims and recent health news. Free.
Consumer Reports Best Buy Drugs* www.consumerreports.org/health/bestbuy-drugs.htm
Independent, nonprofit organization. Compares the benefits, side effects, and costs of different prescription drugs for the same problem, based on information from the Drug Effectiveness Review Project (see listing on page 131). Free.
Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making*
www.informedmedicaldecisions.org
Independent, nonprofit organization. Offers decision aids that describe the treatment options and outcomes for various conditions in order to promote patient involvement in decision making. DVDs must be purchased at http://www.healthdialog.com/hd/Core/CollaborativeCare/videolibrary.htm.
* Two of us (Drs. Schwartz and Woloshin) are on the advisory board for Consumer Reports Best Buy Drugs (unpaid positions). We have been paid consultants reviewing materials for the Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making.
Informed Health Online
Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care, an independent, nonprofit organization established by German health care reform legislation. Describes the science supporting the use of operations, tests, and treatments for a variety of conditions. Free.
Ottawa Health Research Institute Patient Decision Aids
Academic affiliate of the University of Ottawa. Provides a comprehensive inventory of decision aids (plus a rating of their quality), and tells patients how to get them. Some are free.
Sources Created Primarily for Physicians and Policy Makers Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ)
U.S. federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services. Summarizes all the available data about treatments for specific conditions (look for EPC Evidence Reports). Free.
Cochrane Library
www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/mrwhome/106568753/HOME
International, independent, nonprofit organization of researchers. Summarizes all the available data about treatments for specific conditions (look for Cochrane Reviews). Abstracts free, full reports by subscription.
Drug Effectiveness Review Project (DERP)
www.ohsu.edu/drugeffectiveness/reports/final.cfm
Collaboration of public and private organizations developed by Oregon Health and Science University. Provides comparative data on the benefit, side effects, and costs of different prescription drugs for the same problem (source for Consumer Reports Best Buy Drugs). Free.
National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE)
www.nice.org.uk/guidance/index.jsp?action=byTopic
Independent, nonprofit British organization that advises the British National Health Service. Summarizes all the available data about treatments for specific conditions (look for NICE Guidance). Free.
Physician Data Query (PDQ)—National Cancer Institute
www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/pdq
U.S. federal government (part of the National Cancer Institute). Summa- rizes all the available data about cancer prognosis and treatments (look for Cancer Information Summaries). Free.
U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Center for Drug Evaluation and Research
U.S. federal agency under the Department of Health and Human Services, which reviews and approves new and generic drugs. To look up individual drugs, go to http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cder/drugsatfda/index.cfm. After you choose a drug from the index, the Drug Details page appears. If you click Approval History, you may be able to access a Review and then a Medical Review. TheMedical Review contains all the relevant randomized trials submitted to the FDA for approval. From the Drug Details page, you can also access Label Information, when it is available (the package insert that comes with prescription drugs and summarizes excerpts of the review documents). Warning: This site can be challenging. The review documents can be hundreds of pages, and there may be multiple entries for the same drug (because it is used for multiple purposes). Free.
US Preventive Services Task Force
www.ahrq.gov/clinic/uspstfix.htm
Independent panel of experts sponsored by AHRQ. Summarizes the available data about preventive services. After you choose a topic, you’ll see the relevant recommendations; at the bottom of the list, you can click Best- Evidence Systematic Review under Supporting Documents. Free.
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New Resource from the NLM: Subject Guides (Health Statistics, Library Statistics, Conference Proceedings)
This new resource is available at:
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/services/Subject_Guides/subjectguidesonselectedtopics/index.htmNew Resource from the NLM: Subject Guides
The NLM Reference and Web Services Section, Public Services Division, compiled a select set of subject guides. These guides can serve as research starting points for health professionals, researchers, librarians, students, and others. Each guide lists a variety of resources, many of which are Internet accessible and free. These subject guides consist of many resources but should not be considered completely comprehensive.
Released guides cover Health Statistics, Library Statistics, and Conference Proceedings. Two additional guides will be available in late fall covering Drug Information and Genetics/Genomics.
The topics for these Subject Guides are drawn from the most frequently asked questions the Reference and Web Services staff encounters in e-mails and onsite. The staff plans to update the guides, reviewing them as needed to maintain their links and content. We hope you find the Subject Guides useful, and we welcome your comments or suggestions.
- Health Statistics (Listed here, just some of the information at the site)
- Scope –
- The Health Statistics and Numerical Data subject guide includes some of the major sources of health and general statistics in the United States and a brief list of international resources.
- Selected Resources sections consist of a small number of resources chosen from the great number available. Resources include print and online publications, databases, datasets, online tools, and Websites. The majority are from U.S. Government agencies.
- Websites and Portals
- General selected resources
- Specific health conditions and concerns
- Special populations
- Scope –
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New Report: Call for President Obama Urged to ‘Remove Public Veil of Ignorance’ Around State of US Health
View larger map at http://gamapserver.who.int/mapLibrary/Files/Maps/PerCapitaUSD_2011.png
From the 29 August 2013 Science Daily article
In a call to action on the sorry comparative state of U.S. health, researchers at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health are urging President Obama to “remove the public veil of ignorance” and confront a pressing question: Why is America at the bottom? The report, published in the journal Science, appeals to the President to mobilize government to create a National Commission on the Health of Americans. The researchers underscore the importance of this effort in order for the country to begin reversing the decline in the comparative status of U.S. health, which has been four decades in the making.
This is not a challenge that can be left to private groups, no matter how well meaning. Drs. Ronald Bayer and Amy Fairchild, both Professors of Sociomedical Sciences, argue, “The health status of Americans is a social problem that demands social solutions.” More is at stake than the U.S. healthcare system, which fails to provide needed care to millions of Americans. “There is a need for bold public policies that move beyond individual behavior to address the fundamental causes of disease,” Bayer and Fairchild conclude.
A January 2013 report by the U.S. National Research Council (NRC) and Institute of Medicine (IOM) ranks the United States last among peer nations in health status and compares it unfavorably to 17 peer countries at almost every stage of the life course. The report, titled “U.S. Health in International Perspective: Shorter Lives, Poorer Health,” emphasizes that socioeconomic causes are the drivers of these outcomes and details the categories in which the U.S. has the worst or next-to-worst results:
- The U.S. has higher rates of adverse birth outcomes, heart disease, injuries from motor vehicle accidents and violence, sexually acquired diseases, and chronic lung disease.
- Americans lose more years of life to alcohol and other drugs.
- The U.S. has the highest rate of infant mortality among high-income countries.
- The U.S. has the second highest incidence of AIDS and ischemic heart disease,
- For decades, the U.S. has experienced the highest rates of obesity in children and adults as well as diabetes from age 20 and up.
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[World Bank] Health, Nutrition and Population Data and Statistics
From the data section of The World Bank
HealthStats is the World Bank’s comprehensive database of Health, Nutrition and Population (HNP) statistics.
It includes over 250 indicators on topics such as health financing, HIV/AIDS, immunization, malaria and tuberculosis, health workforce and health facilities use, nutrition, reproductive health, population and population projections, cause of death, non-communicable diseases, water and sanitation, with background information on poverty, labor force, economy and education.Users can access HNP data by country, topic, or indicator, and view the resulting data (and wealth quintiles) in tables, charts or maps that can be easily shared through email, Facebook and Twitter.
The above World Bank web page also includes a population growth rate visualization.
A country’s color changes as the growth rate varies annually from 1961 to 2011.
Options for commentary and a chart URL (no custom colors)Check out the Data Visualizer for bigger map. The visualizer also includes options to locate individual countries (with rates), and “freeze frames” by year.
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- Biennial forum focuses on development of long term health strategy (kaieteurnewsonline.com)
- The key to better healthcare lies in data (guardian.co.uk)
Older Americans 2012: Key Indicators of Well-Being
Federal report details health, economic status of older Americans
Today’s older Americans enjoy longer lives and better physical function than did previous generations, although, for some, an increased burden in housing costs and rising obesity may compromise these gains, according to a comprehensive federal look at aging. The report, Older Americans 2012: Key Indicators of Well-Being, tracks trends at regular intervals to see how older people are faring as the U.S. population grows older.
In 2010, 40 million people age 65 and over accounted for 13 percent of the total population in the United States. In 2030, the number and proportion of older Americans is expected to grow significantly—to 72 million, representing nearly 20 percent of the population said the report, by the Federal Interagency Forum on Aging-Related Statistics.
Older Americans 2012, the sixth report prepared by the Forum since 2000, provides an updated and accessible compendium of indicators, drawn from official statistics about the well-being of Americans primarily age 65 and older. The 176-page report provides a broad description of areas of well-being that are improving for older Americans and those that are not. Thirty-seven key indicators are categorized into five broad areas—population, economics, health status, health risks and behaviors, and health care. This year’s report also includes a special feature on the end of life.
Highlights of Older Americans 2012 include:
Increased labor force participation by older women – Participation of older women in the labor force has increased significantly over the past 40 years. In 1963, 29 percent of women aged 62-64 worked outside the home; in 2011, that had increased to 45 percent.
In 1963, 17 percent of women aged 65-69 were in the labor force; in 2011, that had increased to 27 percent. For women 70 and older, 6 percent worked in 1963, increasing to 8 percent in 2011. Some older Americans work out of economic necessity. Others may be attracted by the social contact, intellectual challenges or sense of value that work often provides.
Declines in poverty, increases in income since 1974 – Older Americans are in better economic shape now than they were in 1974. Between 1974 and 2010, the proportion of older people with income below the poverty thresholds (less than $10,458 in 2010 for a person 65 and older) fell from 15 percent to 9 percent. The percentage with low income (between $10,458 and $20,916 in 2010 for people 65 and older) dropped from 35 percent to 26 percent. There were also notable gains in income over the period, as the proportion of people 65 and older with high income ($41,832 and above in 2010) rose from 18 percent to 31 percent.
Increased housing problems –The most significant issue by far is housing cost burden, which has been steadily increasing over time. In 1985, about 30 percent of households with householders or spouses age 65 and over spent more than 30 percent of their income on housing and utilities. By 2009, the proportion of older people with high housing cost burden reached 40 percent. For some multigenerational households, crowded housing is also fairly prevalent.
Rising rates of obesity – Obesity, a major cause of preventable disease and premature death, is increasing among older people. In 2009-2010, 38 percent of people age 65 and over were obese, compared with 22 percent in 1988-1994. In 2009-2010, 44 percent of people age 65-74 were obese, as were 29 percent of those age 75 and older.
More use of hospice –The percentage of older people who received hospice care in the last 30 days of life increased from 19 percent in 1999 to 43 percent in 2009. The percentage of older Americans who died in hospitals dropped from 49 percent in 1999 to 32 percent in 2009. The percentage who died at home increased from 15 percent in 1999 to 24 percent in 2009. In 2009, there were notable differences in the use of hospice services at the end of life among people of different race and ethnicity groups.
Older Americans 2012:
Key Indicators of Well-Being
This report provides the latest data on the 37 key indicators selected by the Forum to portray aspects of the lives of older Americans and their families. It is divided into five subject areas: population, economics, health status, health risks and behaviors, and health care.
Press Note (PDF)
Federal report details health, economic status of older Americans
Today’s older Americans enjoy longer lives and better physical function than did previous generations, although, for some, an increased burden in housing costs and rising obesity may compromise these gains, according to a comprehensive federal look at aging. The report, Older Americans 2012: Key Indicators of Well-Being, tracks trends at regular intervals to see how older people are faring as the U.S. population grows older.
In 2010, 40 million people age 65 and over accounted for 13 percent of the total population in the United States. In 2030, the number and proportion of older Americans is expected to grow significantly—to 72 million, representing nearly 20 percent of the population said the report, by the Federal Interagency Forum on Aging-Related Statistics.
Older Americans 2012, the sixth report prepared by the Forum since 2000, provides an updated and accessible compendium of indicators, drawn from official statistics about the well-being of Americans primarily age 65 and older. The 176-page report provides a broad description of areas of well-being that are improving for older Americans and those that are not. Thirty-seven key indicators are categorized into five broad areas—population, economics, health status, health risks and behaviors, and health care. This year’s report also includes a special feature on the end of life.
Highlights of Older Americans 2012 include:
Increased labor force participation by older women – Participation of older women in the labor force has increased significantly over the past 40 years. In 1963, 29 percent of women aged 62-64 worked outside the home; in 2011, that had increased to 45 percent.In 1963, 17 percent of women aged 65-69 were in the labor force; in 2011, that had increased to 27 percent. For women 70 and older, 6 percent worked in 1963, increasing to 8 percent in 2011. Some older Americans work out of economic necessity. Others may be attracted by the social contact, intellectual challenges or sense of value that work often provides.
Declines in poverty, increases in income since 1974 – Older Americans are in better economic shape now than they were in 1974. Between 1974 and 2010, the proportion of older people with income below the poverty thresholds (less than $10,458 in 2010 for a person 65 and older) fell from 15 percent to 9 percent. The percentage with low income (between $10,458 and $20,916 in 2010 for people 65 and older) dropped from 35 percent to 26 percent. There were also notable gains in income over the period, as the proportion of people 65 and older with high income ($41,832 and above in 2010) rose from 18 percent to 31 percent.
Increased housing problems –The most significant issue by far is housing cost burden, which has been steadily increasing over time. In 1985, about 30 percent of households with householders or spouses age 65 and over spent more than 30 percent of their income on housing and utilities. By 2009, the proportion of older people with high housing cost burden reached 40 percent. For some multigenerational households, crowded housing is also fairly prevalent.
Rising rates of obesity – Obesity, a major cause of preventable disease and premature death, is increasing among older people. In 2009-2010, 38 percent of people age 65 and over were obese, compared with 22 percent in 1988-1994. In 2009-2010, 44 percent of people age 65-74 were obese, as were 29 percent of those age 75 and older.
More use of hospice –The percentage of older people who received hospice care in the last 30 days of life increased from 19 percent in 1999 to 43 percent in 2009. The percentage of older Americans who died in hospitals dropped from 49 percent in 1999 to 32 percent in 2009. The percentage who died at home increased from 15 percent in 1999 to 24 percent in 2009. In 2009, there were notable differences in the use of hospice services at the end of life among people of different race and ethnicity groups.
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- Older Americans Hit by Obesity, Housing Costs (livescience.com)
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U.S. Launches Interactive HIV/AIDS Database on Census.gov
From the July 23 2012 US Census press release
The U.S. Census Bureau today launched aninteractive global resource on the prevalence of HIV infection and AIDS cases and deaths. The database was developed in 1987 and now holds 149,000 statistics, an increase of approximately 10,800 new estimates in the last year, making it the most complete of its kind in the world. The launch comes as thousands of people worldwide meet in Washington, D.C., for the International AIDS Conference this week.
The resource is maintained by the Census Bureau with funding from the U.S. President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) through the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
U.S. Global AIDS Coordinator Ambassador Eric Goosby, head of PEPFAR, said on the launch, “This release of the HIV/AIDS database will expand global access to data that are critical to understanding the epidemic. This information is invaluable for the evidence-based response PEPFAR is championing.”
Census Bureau Director Robert Groves said “This database provides the people who need it with quality statistics — supporting the life-saving efforts of our partners at PEPFAR and USAID and the doctors, nurses and public health officials working to reach the end of AIDS.”
The tool is a library of statistics from more than 12,000 articles in international scientific and medical journals, individual countries’ annual HIV/AIDS surveillance reports, and papers and posters presented at international conferences.
The menu-driven access tool permits users to search for statistical information in countries and territories across the world, as well as by subpopulation, geographic subarea (such as urban and rural), age, sex and year (back to 1960).
Statistics for the United States are available separately from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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Government in action – Quick Health Data Online (Free telephone training today, June 14)
Can’t make the training? Guided help at the Web site (Look for the “Get Started Now” Box
About Quick Health Data Online
The Department of Health and Human Services Office on Women’s Health has developed an important online tool: Quick Health Data Online. Quick Health Data Online contains extensive health data for the years 1998-2004 for the entire United States, and it will be updated on a yearly basis. National, regional, state, and county data are available and the data can be stratified by gender, race/ethnicity, and age concurrently.
The database includes statistics on:
- Demographics
- Mortality
- Access to care
- Infections and chronic disease
- Reproductive health
- Maternal health
- Mental health
- Prevention
- Violence and abuse
Quick Health Data Online 101
QHDO 101 will provide an overview on health indicators available, preparing custom queries, and generating tables, graphs, and basic maps.
- Monday, April 16: 3-4 p.m. (EST)
- Monday, May 14: 2-3 p.m. (EST)
- Tuesday, June 12: 1-2 p.m. (EST)
Quick Health Data Online 201
QHDO 201 will detail the comprehensive mapping features.
- Wednesday, April 18: 1-2 p.m. (EST)
- Wednesday, May 16: 2-3 p.m. (EST)
- Thursday, June 14: 3-4 p.m. (EST
Register today! (for the training)
The toll-free conference call number and other details are provided at the registration site. You need to be at a computer with Internet access and a telephone.
The psychiatric profile of the U.S. patient population across age groups
From the article at the May 2012 issue of Open Journal of Epidemiology
[Abstract] Introduction: As the U.S. population undergoes continuous shifts the population’s health profile changes dynamically resulting in more or less expression of certain psychiatric disorders and utilization of health-care resources. In this paper, we analyze national data on the psychiatric morbidity of American patients and their summated cost in different age groups. Methods: The latest data (2009) on the number of hospital discharges and national bill (hospital charges) linked with psychiatric disorders were extracted from the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS). Results: National data shows that mood disorders are the largest diagnostic category in terms of percentage of psychiatri-crelated discharges in the 1 – 17 years age group. The proportion decreases gradually as age progresses while delirium, dementia, amnestic and other cognitive disorders increase exponentially after 65 years of age. Schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders as well as alcohol and substance-related disorders peak in the working age groups (18 – 64 years). From an economic point of view, mood disorders in the 18 – 44 age group has the highest national bill ($5.477 billion) followed by schizophrenic and other psychotic disorders in the same age group ($4.337 billion) and mood disorders in the 45 – 64 age group ($4.310 billion). On the third place come schizophrenic and other psychotic disorders in the 45 – 64 age group ($3.931 billion). Conclusion: This paper illustrates the high cost of psychiatric care in the U.S., especially the large fraction of healthcare money spent on working-age patients suffering from mood disorders. This underlines psychiatric cost-efficiency as a vital topic in the current healthcare debate.
Related article
- Major Depressive Episode among Full-Time College Students and Other Young Adults, Aged 18 to 22 (US Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration, May 2012)
Funding Public Parks Could Save Lives
….”recent research suggests that parks aren’t just good for our well-being, they may even be a matter of life and death. In a December 2005 Environmental Health Perspectives article, Amy Schulz and her colleagues suggested that parks might be a protective factor in cardiovascular disease risk; an absence of safe parks may be part of why poverty leads to poorer health outcomes. Amy Auchincloss and her colleagues reported in a 2009 Archives of Internal Medicine piece that residential areas which support physical activity, by having things like ample park space, were associated with a lower incidence of Type 2 diabetes. With links like this sprouting up at increasing rates, researchers have even started to examine which specific park components offer the biggest health bang. In the September 2011 issue of the Journal of Physical Activity and Health, for example, Ariane Rung and her colleagues found that basketball courts and playgrounds offered the highest rate of energy expenditure.
Read more: http://ideas.time.com/2011/12/29/funding-parks-could-save-lives/#ixzz1hvsNxU4C
Health, United States is an annual report on trends in health statistics
Health United States is an annual report on trends in health statistics.
Health, United States presents national trends in health statistics on suchtopics 
[PDF – 10.5 MB] as birth and death rates, infant mortality, life expectancy, morbidity and health status, risk factors, use of ambulatory and inpatient care, health personnel and facilities, financing of health care, health insurance and managed care, and other health topics.
Need help getting started on how to get information in this report? Click here.
FAQs about this report may be found here.
From the Web Page
Health, United States is an annual report on trends in health statistics.
2010 Edition [PDF – 10.5 MB]
2010 In Brief Edition
2010 Special Feature
Health, United States, 2010 Charts and Tables
- 41 Figures as PowerPoint slides
[PPT – 2.6 MB]
- 41 Chartbook Data Tables in Excel format
- 148 Trend Tables in Excel and PDF format (including additional data years and standard errors)
- Updated trend tables are available
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Health Data Tools and Statistics on PHPartners.org | Health Information Literacy – for health and well being
From the Blog…Health Data Tools and Statistics on PHPartners.org | Health Information Literacy – for health and well being.
The following was posted on the BHIC Blog; Sep 11, 2011 10:26 PM by Cheryl Rowan
The Health Data Tools and Statistics page (http://phpartners.org/health_stats.html) on the PHPartners website (http://phpartners.org) website has been reorganized to make public health data and statistics easier to find and use.
The page has been reorganized so that links to County and Local Health Data now appear at the top of the page. In addition, several new categories have been added.
The Partners in Information Access for the Public Health Workforce (PHPartners) is a collaboration of U.S. government agencies, public health organizations, and health science libraries.
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A Statistical New World” and Other Creative (Bio)statistics Diddies
From the 18 August 2011 Tens and Twos with Dr. Felicia Mebane (public health) blog item A Statistical New World” and Other Creative (Bio)statistics Diddie
FINALLY! Some creative videos on statistics. I wonder if they read my prior emails begging for more creativity in this area
.
This year, the American Statistical Association hosted a “Promoting the Practice and Profession of Statistics” video competition. And, one of the three winning videos was from graduate students and staff in the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health. YAY, biostats!
The State of America’s Children – 2011 Report
From the Children Defense Fund Web site
CDF’s new report The State of America’s Children 2011 finds children have fallen further behind in many of the leading indicators over the past year as the country slowly climbs out of the recession. This is a comprehensive compilation and analysis of the most recent and reliable national and state-by-state data on population, poverty, family structure, family income, health, nutrition, early childhood development, education, child welfare, juvenile justice, and gun violence. The report provides key child data showing alarming numbers of children at risk: children are the poorest age group with 15.5 million children—one in every five children in America—living in poverty, and more than 60 percent of fourth, eighth and 12th grade public school students are reading or doing math below grade level.
View this year’s interactive report or download the document.
Related articles
- Race and Child Welfare (fosterwee.wordpress.com)
- Op-Ed Columnist: The Decade of Lost Children (nytimes.com)
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- Report: Recession Catastrophic for Children (theroot.com)
- Many child deaths ‘preventable’ (cutie79.wordpress.com)
World Health Statistics 2011 now available online
The WHO (World Health Organization) World Health Statistics 2011 is now available online.
It contains WHO’s annual compilation of health-related data for its 193 Member States, and includes a summary of the progress made towards achieving the health-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and associated targets.
Click here to download the full report, sections, or data tables only.
13 MAY 2011 | GENEVA – An increasing number of countries are facing a double burden of disease as the prevalence of risk factors for chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart diseases and cancers increase and many countries still struggle to reduce maternal and child deaths caused by infectious diseases, for the Millennium Development Goals, according to the World Health Statistics 2011 released by the WHO today.
Noncommunicable diseases such heart diseases, stroke, diabetes and cancer, now make up two-thirds of all deaths globally, due to the population aging and the spread of risk factors associated with globalization and urbanization. The control of risk factors such as tobacco use, sedentary lifestyle, unhealthy diet and excessive use of alcohol becomes more critical. The latest WHO figures showed that about 4 out of 10 men and 1 in 11 women are using tobacco and about 1 in 8 adults is obese.
In addition many developing countries continue to battle health issues such as pneumonia, diarrhoea and malaria that are most likely to kill children under the age of five. In 2009, 40% of all child deaths were among newborns (aged 28 days or less). Much more needs to be done to achieve the MDGs by the target date of 2015, but progress has accelerated.
Child mortality declined at 2.7% per year since 2000, twice as fast as during the 1990s (1.3%). Mortality among children under five years fell from 12.4 million in 1990 to 8.1 million in 2009.
Maternal mortality declined at 3.3% per year since 2000, almost twice as fast in the decade after 2000 than during the 1990s (2%). The number of women dying as a result of complications during pregnancy and childbirth has decreased from 546,000 in 1990 to 358,000 in 2008.
“This evidence really shows that no country in the world can address health from either an infectious disease perspective or a noncommunicable disease one. Everyone must develop a health system that addresses the full range of the health threats in both areas.” says Ties Boerma, Director of WHO’s Department of Health Statistics and Informatics.The report also shows that more money is being spent on health and people can expect to live longer (life expectancy in 2009 was 68 years, up from 64 years in 1990); but the gap in health spending between low- and high-income countries remains very large.
In low-income countries, per capita, health expenditure is an estimated US$ 32 (or about 5.4% of gross domestic product) and in high-income countries it is US$ 4590 (or about 11% of gross domestic product).
High-income countries have, per capita, on average 10 times more doctors, 12 times more nurses and midwives and 30 times more dentists than low-income countries.
Virtually all deliveries of babies in high-income countries are attended by skilled health personnel; but this is the case for only 40% of deliveries in low-income countries.
Editor Flahiff’s note....This is certainly born out by my Peace Corps experience. In 1980/81 Liberia, I remember attending the funeral of a well to do area woman who died in childbirth. And I remember how heartbroken one of my students was at the death of her month old child. Malaria and diarrhea were epidemic.
I am now sponsoring a Liberian who wants to be a nurse. I cannot begin to imagine what the Liberian health care system is facing. Many of the infectious diseases will probably continue to decrease at least partly due to better sanitation (as more pump wells as opposed to open wells). But these diseases will remain and she will be facing increasing populations with non infectious diseases. I only hope that countries with resources (as the US) will work to empower Liberians and others to meet these challenges. It is not only a matter of global security, but of respecting human dignity.
Related articles
- Nurses addressing access, quality & health (blog item at the Center for Health Media and Policy at Hunter College)
“The first week of May, 2300 registered nurses from 123 countries attended the International Council of NursesConference in Malta. We left challenged and charged to act on the innovative ideas presented by this year’s 70 expert presenters. The topics covered were extensive including the massive increase of non-communicable diseases (NCDs), primary care, climate change, disaster nursing, and gender violence. CHMP’s co-director, Diana Mason, delivered the keynote focusing on the conference theme, nurses driving access, quality and health,addressing social determinants of health. She provided insights into how mobile health creates access to health care and selected innovative models of care designed by nurses globally challenging us to think broadly on how we can impact change to increase access and quality care. Mason crafted a powerful visual presentation that provided the backdrop to her engaging, thought-provoking presentation which earned her a standing ovation.”….
- Chronic diseases now leading global killer: WHO (ctv.ca)
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Food Environment Atlas / Food Desert Locator
The USDA’s Food Environment Atlas allows one to “get a spacial view of a community’s ability to access healthy food and its success in doing so”.
County level statistics can be viewed on food choices, health and well-being indicators, and community characteristics.
The Food Desert Locator identifies low-income census tracts where a substantial number or share of residents has low access to a supermarket or large grocery store. The interactive map is similar to the Food Environment Atlas.
Related articles
- USDA issues “food desert” locator (sfgate.com)
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- The food desert in your own backyard (eatocracy.cnn.com)
- USDA: Atlas of Rural and Small-Town America (ruralcommunitybuilding.fb.org)
- “Government Releases Food Desert Locator” and related posts (huffingtonpost.com)
2009 Community Health Status Indicators (CHSI) Report Now Available
The 2009 Community Health Status Indicators (CHSI) Report, a 16 page, county-specific overview of population health conveying 200 indicators in a ready-for-action format, is now available.
The report may be found here.
Some of the many features
**over 200 measures for each of the 3,141 United States counties
**community profiles can be displayed on maps or downloaded in a brochure format
**visually compare similar counties (termed peer counties) as well as adjacent counties with their county
CDC Web Site for Public Health Tracking
The US Centers for Disease Control(CDC) has recently launched the National Environmental Public Health Tracking Network. This network is part of an organizational shift by the CDC from infectious disease to environmental health.
It aims to correlate how the environment might affect a person’s health and how people might affect the health of the environment. It also allows users to find local environmental health data.
Currently information is arranged under three topics at the home page:
- Environments (Homes, Outdoor Air, and Water)
- (7)Health Effects including asthma, lead poisoning, heart attacks, cancer, and reproductive/birth outcomes
- Info by Location where data are displayed by state, county, and zip code.
Check out the About page for more information.
Steve Luce of the CDC spoke about this product at this year’s CAPHIS **business meeting.
His presentation included the following points:
- The public is certainly welcome to view the data at the Web site. However, the CDC does not recommend that the public take actions based on the data. The data is being made available primarily for local entities to build programs based on that data.
- Privacy laws prevented access to some data at “very” local levels. That data would be available only to professionals with a need to know. Small geographic levels with small populations increase the probability that individuals could be identified.
- There are presently overlaps with Toxtown. However efforts are being made to reduce duplication.
**Consumer and Patient Health Information Section of the Medical Library Association
HHS Launches Community Health Data Initiative to Help Communities and
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has recently launched a national initiative to share a wealth of new community health data that will drive innovation and lead to the creation of new applications and tools to improve the health of Americans.
“At the heart of the Initiative, increasing amounts of federally generated community health data will be made publicly available, in easily accessible and useful formats. Secretary Sebelius announced that by the end of 2010, a new HHS Health Indicators Warehouse will be deployed online, providing currently available and new HHS data on national, state, regional, and county health performance – on indicators such as rates of smoking, obesity, diabetes, access to healthy food, utilization of health care services, etc. – in an easy-to-use “one stop data shop.” The Warehouse will also include information on proven ways to improve performance on particular indicators. Users will be able to explore all of this data on the Warehouse Web site, download any and all of it for free, and integrate it easily into their own Web sites and applications.”
More information on this initiative may be found here.
About
This blog presents a sampling of health and medical news and resources for all. Selected articles and resources will hopefully be of general interest but will also encourage further reading through posted references and other links. Currently I am focusing on public health, basic and applied research and very broadly on disease and healthy lifestyle topics.
Several times a month I will post items on international and global health issues. My Peace Corps Liberia experience (1980-81) has formed me as a global citizen in many ways and has challenged me to think of health and other topics in a more holistic manner.
Do you have an informational question in the health/medical area?
Email me at jmflahiff@yahoo.com
I will reply within 48 hours.
This blog is a companion site to my Health and Medical News and Resources Web site with…
- Great places to start (locating health information)
- Links to help from others (as health care providers and support groups)
- Interactive tools (as health calculators and apps)
- Select related news sites and blogs
My professional work experience and education includes over 15 years experience as a medical librarian and a Master’s in Library Science. In my most recent position I enjoyed contributing to our library’s blog, performing in depth literature searches, and collaborating with faculty, staff, students, and the general public.
While I will never be be able to keep up with the universe of current health/medical news, I subscribe to the following to glean entries for this blog.
- Science Daily – Your source for the latest research news
- MedlinePlus email updates from the US National Institutes of Health
- Partners in Information Access for the Public Health Workforce – a collaboration of U.S. government agencies, public health organizations and health sciences libraries
- US Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) news now with updates on the agency’s efforts to “improve the quality, safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of health care for all Americans”
- Research Buzz, “news about search engines, digital archives, online museums, databases, and other Internet information collections since 1998”
- Scout Report, a “weekly publication offering a selection of new and newly discovered Internet resources of interest to researchers and educators”
- KevinMD.com -“Social Media’s leading physician voice”
- EurekAlert-Medicine and Health
Health and Medical News and Resources 
