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CHILDHOOD LEUKAEMIA IN SWEDEN: USING GIS AND A SPATIAL SCAN STATISTIC FOR CLUSTER DETECTION
Author(s) -
HJALMARS ULF,
KULLDORFF MARTIN,
GUSTAFSSON GÖRAN,
NAGARWALLA NEVILLE
Publication year - 1996
Publication title -
statistics in medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.996
H-Index - 183
eISSN - 1097-0258
pISSN - 0277-6715
DOI - 10.1002/(sici)1097-0258(19960415)15:7/9<707::aid-sim242>3.0.co;2-4
Subject(s) - scan statistic , epidemiology , childhood leukaemia , statistic , cluster (spacecraft) , cluster analysis , population , spatial epidemiology , geography , medicine , demography , statistics , environmental health , computer science , pediatrics , pathology , mathematics , sociology , programming language
The study of disease clustering is becoming increasingly common in the field of medical epidemiology. There is great public concern and numerous reports on perceived clusters of various diseases, with cancers, and especially leukaemia, being the most commonly studied. We present a population based study on acute childhood leukaemia in Sweden 1973–1993, illustrating the possibility of a system for full‐scale spatial epidemiological study design. The aim of the study is to test a large set of childhood leukaemia cases for the presence of geographical clusters. Necessary prerequisites, in the form of extensive population and disease data, a tool for geographical spatial analysis and a proper statistical method were fulfilled. No significant clusters were found.