The CHORDS Toolkit for Health and Geospatial Exposures Research
2024-08-06
Introduction
Researchers interested in studying the health impacts of climate change and related natural disasters need access to relevant, timely, and harmonized data on environmental exposures, social determinants of health variables, and health outcomes. However, such datasets are often developed for different purposes, reside in multiple locations, and require linkage.
The Climate and Health Outcomes Research Data Systems (CHORDS) Toolkit seeks to aid researchers in accessing, processing, and integrating geospatial data-based exposures into their health research by providing guides, tools, and example code.
About CHORDS
The Climate and Health Outcomes Research Data Systems (CHORDS) program provides resources aimed at making it easier for researchers to study the effects of place-based environmental exposures on health outcomes. The CHORDS resources include a web-based data catalog, standardized data sets, and this toolkit.
About This Toolkit
Getting Started
This toolkit provides guides, tools, and example code in R. The CHORDS Toolkit GitHub repository provides the underlying code and data for this book.
The CHORDS toolkit has been developed to support different types of users, such as students, clinicians, and data managers. Please see the User Profile Appendix for descriptions and suggested relevant toolkit chapters for each user profile.
This toolkit does require familiarity with the R programming language and the use of R for working with, visualizing, and analyzing scientific data. The TAME Toolkit provides resources for getting started with R for environmental health research. Additionally, the book Geocomputation with R provides resources for geospatial data analysis with R.
The toolkit consists of a series of chapters organized into the following units:
Foundations: This unit provides background, guidance and example code for working with different types of geospatial data common in environmental health research. This unit is intended as a starting point for users with less familiarity with geospatial data analysis methods in environmental health.
Wildfire Data: This unit provides guidance for working with different types of wildfire-related data in climate change and health research.
Other Environmental Data: This unit provides guidance and code for working with specific sources of environmental data common in environmental health research for characterizing environmental exposures as well as social determinants of health.
Health Data Integration: This unit provides guidance and code for integrating environmental and health data in climate change and health research, both at the individual level and at the population level.
Case Studies: This unit provides example case studies that analyze integrated wildfire-related data with health outcomes data.
The following toolkit chapters are currently in development:
| Unit | Chapter Topic | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Foundations | Mapping Geospatial Data | In Development |
| Foundations | Calculating Geospatial Covariates | In Development |
Funding
This resource was supported by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) and NIH Office of Data Science Strategy (ODSS), and the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) Office of the Secretary’s Patient Centered Outcomes Research Trust Fund (OS-PCORTF).