Public Health Resources

I often talk to students interested in learning NVivo. Watching training videos is the best place to start, followed by coming to me for more specific questions. This provides a great tutorial for those with some NVivo familiarity on the various data visualization functionalities of the program. This helps you do an exploratory analysis of your data. I honestly find these of limited utility, but may be useful for some.

Beginning with CDC frameworks and assessments is a best practice for new and established public health professionals. Then shift to other needs assessments if they are a better fit. Rapid community assessment (RCA) is a process for quickly collecting community insights about a public health issue in order to inform program design. The assessment involves reviewing existing data and conducting community-based interviews, listening sessions, observations, social listening, and surveys. On this page, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shares an assessment guide and tools for those who wish to better understand their community's needs regarding COVID-19 vaccine acceptance and uptake among adults, adolescents, and children.

Resource page supporting academics who wish to engage in harm reduction, anti-racist, drug policy reform. Founded in January 2016, DPA's Department of Research and Academic Engagement (DRAE) works to bridge the divide between research and effective drug policies. Our drug policies are driven by ideology, politics, stigma, greed, and/or racism rather than the evidence about what works. We at DRAE believe that it is more important than ever to promote policies grounded in scholarship and that policymakers need tools to access and use research.

Tutorials to use UDS Mapper. The UDS Mapper is designed to help inform users about the current geographic extent of U.S. federal (Section 330) Health Center Program (HCP) awardees and look-alikes, and was largely designed upon algorithms and reporting methods developed by John Snow, Inc. for BPHC-requested service area analyses. The information available in the UDS Mapper includes estimates of the collective service area of these health centers by ZCTA, including the ratio of HCP awardee and look-alike patients reported in the Uniform Data System (UDS) to the target population, the change in the number of those reported patients over time, and an estimate of those in the target population that remain unserved by HCP awardees and look-alikes reporting data to the UDS (but may be served by other providers). Due to data limitations, this tool is meant to be only one of many important resources available for exploring the extent of health centers. To inform additional exploration, users can also map U.S. Census data and see the locations of all HCP awardees and look-alikes and their service delivery sites, locations of other federally-linked providers (NHSC Sites, Rural Health Clinics, Tribal Organization Facilities, etc.), and shortage areas such as Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs) and Medically Underserved Areas/Populations (MUA/Ps).

Provides primary source data on global development, gender, statistics, and demographics. Can compare countries to one another.

An organization that provides up to the minute statistics on a variety of social and health indicators. See its page of sources for county level statistical offices. Link takes you to a list of global primary data sources.

Worldmapper is a collection of world maps called cartograms, where territories are resized on each map according to the subject of interest. Covers a variety of topics including health, climate, and politics. Good place for exploratory analysis

Overall, between 1980 and 2003, the number of drug offenders in prison or jail increased by 1100% from 41,100 in 1980 to 493,800 in 2003, with a remarkable rise in arrests concentrated in African American communities. This precipitous escalation began as the result of a tangible shift in law enforcement practices toward aggressively pursuing drug offenses.

America, land of the free, has earned the disturbing distinction of being the world's leading jailer. Representing just 5 percent of the world's population, we now hold 25 percent of its inmates. The "tough on crime" politics of the 1980s and 1990s fueled an explosion in incarceration rates.

Traces disease outbreaks at the global, national, and local levels.

Provides demographic, public health and global health data. You can research population census data, surveys, registries, indicators and estimates, administrative health data, and financial data related to health

From the Kaiser Family Foundation reports on HIV, malaria and TB around the world.

Maps in a VERY visual way global indicators of infectious disease, wealth, nutritional deficiency burden, labor strikes, public health spending, nurses working, religion, fuel used, etc.

Provides social and health data from member countries.

PAHO (Pan American Health Organization) Country Health Profiles offers country specific data for Latin America.

In 1995, the Regional Core Health Data and Country Profile Initiative was launched by the Pan American Health Organization / Regional Office of the World Health Organization ( WHO) to monitor the attainment of health goals and compliance with the mandates of the Member States, in addition to ensuring the availability of a basic set of data to be collected annually that would make it possible to characterize the health situation and trends in the countries of the Region of the Americas.

Provides statistical information on economics, agriculture, development, education, labor, and health.

Produced by the World Health Organization. Provides statistical and epidemiological data on health and diseases.