May 15, 2007

MI-Info: Public Health Informatics

MI-Info is an NIH grant funded project to bring core information and informatics skills to the public health workforce in Michigan through skills building tutorials and highlighted resources. Major tutorial topics include:

* Evidence Based Public Health
* Finding Health Statistics Online
* Searching the Internet
* Searching the Public Health Literature
* Staying Informed
* Health Education Resources

While the primary focus is on the public health workforce, these clear and easy-to-follow tutorials cover information skills much need by all health care workers and highlight both free resources as well as those limited to residents of the state Michigan. Highly recommended.

Michigan Informatics (MI-Info): informatics for the public health workforce: http://www.sph.umich.edu/mi-info/

Posted by pfa at 02:18 PM | Comments (0)

April 30, 2007

Preschool Tooth Decay On the Rise

New from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), the most recent statistical report on oral health trends in America has as its most publicized finding the increase of caries in preschool children.

Oral Health Improving for Most Americans, But Tooth Decay Among Preschool Children on the Rise: http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/07newsreleases/oralhealth.htm

Trends in Oral Health Status: United States, 1988-1994 and 1999-2004. Series 11, Number 248. 104 pp. (PHS) 2007-1698. Preliminary Report. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_11/sr11_248.pdf [PDF 2.8MB]

Posted by pfa at 12:54 PM | Comments (0)

December 09, 2006

NIDCR/CDC Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Data Resource Center

For those of you not aware of this resource, it is worth checking out. The NIDCR/CDC DOCDRC contains a large amount of collated data on topics of interest, including:

- Dental Caries
- Dental Visits
- Oral and Pharyngeal Cancers
- Self-Assessed Oral Health Status
- Periodontal Assessment/Disease
- Usual Source of Dental Care
- Sealants
- Orofacial Pain
- Smokeless Tobacco Lesions
- Tobacco Use
- Tooth Loss
- Dental Insurance

They also include test instruments, a search engine to locate specific queries or data sets, and links to recommended resources. One example of these useful links is this new report from MMWR.

Surveillance for Dental Caries, Dental Sealants, Tooth Retention, Edentulism, and Enamel Fluorosis -- United States 1988-1994 and 1999-2002. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5403a1.htm

You may have previously encountered this useful resources as:

National Oral Health Information Clearinghouse: The Oral health database at the no longer functional URL of
http://www.nohic.nidcr.nih.gov/data.html

This was a subsection of the Combined Health Information Database, which was discontinued September 2006.

We recently received notice that there is a new location for this, so please update your bookmarks!

-----------------------------------
The NIDCR/CDC Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Data Resource Center (DRC) is moving to a new server!

During the transition to the new server, people attempting to access the DRC Web site may receive an error message, instead of being redirected to the new Web address.

Please update your bookmarks for the DRC's new URL -- http://drc.hhs.gov/ .

For more information please contact:
Pamela Martinez, MLS
Senior Research Librarian
NIDCR/CDC Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Data Resource Center
2101 Gaither Rd., Suite 600
Rockville, MD 20850
pamela.martinez@ngc.com
301-527-6670

Posted by pfa at 08:23 AM | Comments (0)

December 05, 2006

Health Statistics and More: NationMaster / StateMaster

Did you know that West Virginia ranks #1 of 52 for totally edentulous residents(43%), but 47 of 52 for residents who've had at least one visit to the dentist per calendar year?* The StateMaster website will give you not only that information, but will also provide supporting bar graphs and colored map plots to illustrate both concepts. StateMaster will even look for correlations between one data set and selected other datasets, such as number of dentists per state and the amount of education funding per state.

NationMaster is a similar tool that works with data from different countries. This means you can see that the United States ranks 29th of 30 for daily smokers (Austria is 1st) but 9th overall for deaths from cancer (with Austria a distant 13th). Obviously there is more to cancer than just smoking, eh? NationMaster appears to exclude data from South America, African, Middle East, East Asia, China, and Russia, at least for the topics I was checking. It seems to mostly compare data for 1st World countries. StateMaster includes all the American states and territories, and is more complete for scope, at this point in time. NationMaster has 168 health statistics topics and StateMaster has 262 (of 3,435 stats on other topics).

In addition to the data, charts, graphs, maps, and correlations, both these tools bring the information to you, not just making you go find what you want. Each page has at the top interesting tidbits or factoids. Examples included that nursing homes are better in Wisconsin and Alaska spends the most on education.

All in all, worth checking out!

NationMaster: http://www.nationmaster.com/

StateMaster: http://www.statemaster.com/

NationMaster: Health Statistics: http://www.nationmaster.com/cat/hea-health

StateMaster: Health Statistics: http://www.statemaster.com/cat/hea-health

* By the way, Michigan ranks #8 on annual dental visits and #39 on edentulous residents, with 17%. Michigan also ranks #18 for number of dentists per capita with 0.597 per 1,000 people, but #8 overall for the total number of dentists with 6,039.

Posted by pfa at 01:50 PM | Comments (0)

November 17, 2006

Health Statistics and Trends: New EBook Available

There is a new electronic book available that provides very useful information on the health statistics and trends in America. It is a chartbook, so includes presentation-ready graphics to illustrate the concepts included. The content is available both in an interactive and searchable online version as well as a formatted PDF version for downloading. Just as a small sampling of the topics included are trends in dental visits, untreated dental caries, mothers who smoked during pregnancy, and much much more.

Health, United States, 2005 (With Chartbook on Trends in the Health of Americans) [U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Michael O. Leavitt, Secretary; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Julie Louise Gerberding, M.D., M.P.H., Director; National Center for Health Statistics, Edward J. Sondik, Ph.D., Director]:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/bv.fcgi?rid=healthus05.chapter.trend-tables
PDF Version: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/bookres.fcgi/healthus05/healthus05.pdf

Posted by pfa at 11:20 AM | Comments (0)

October 20, 2006

US Water Fluoridation Maps Available

New from the CDC, an interactive map of the United States that allows you to check local water fluoridation levels.

"My Water’s Fluoride allows consumers in currently participating states to learn the fluoridation status of their water system."

To use this map, click first on the state, then on the county, and lastly on the city. Many city entries will also include the option to view the operational reports for that jurisdiction.

CDC: My Water's Fluoride: http://apps.nccd.cdc.gov/MWF/Index.asp

Posted by pfa at 08:27 AM | Comments (0)

October 10, 2006

More Dental Statistics from the CDC

Our previous entry on statistics focused primarily on international resources. What if you want to know the percentage of edentulous persons in Utah? The US data is available in various forms from the CDC. Here are some examples of information available.

CDC: National Oral Health Surveillance System: http://www.cdc.gov/nohss/

Beltran-Aguilar ED, Barker LK, Canto MT, Dye BA, Gooch BF, Griffin SO, Hyman J, Jaramillo F, Kingman A, Nowjack-Raymer R, Selwitz RH, Wu T. Surveillance for Dental Caries, Dental Sealants, Tooth Retention, Edentulism, and Enamel Fluorosis. MMWR Surveillance Summaries 2005;54(03);1–44. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5403a1.htm

Eke, PI, Thornton-Evans GO, DDS, Beckles GL. Dental Visits Among Dentate Adults with Diabetes—United States, 1999 and 2004. MMWR, November 25, 2005;54(46):1181–1183. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5446a3.htm

Gooch BF, Eke PI, Malvitz DM. Public Health and Aging: Retention of Natural Teeth Among Older Adults -- United States, 2002. MMWR;52(50):1226–29. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5250a3.htm

Macek M, Matte T, Sinks T, Malvitz D. Blood Lead Concentrations in Children and Method of Water Fluoridation, United States, 1988–1994. Environmental Health Perspectives 2005. Available from http://dx.doi.org/* using code: 10.1289/ehp.8319.

Surveillance for Use of Preventive Health-Care Services by Older Adults, 1995-1997. MMWR, December 17, 1999;48(SS08):51–88. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss4808a4.htm

Total Tooth Loss Among Persons Aged Greater Than or Equal to 65 Years — Selected States, 1995-1997. MMWR, March 19, 1999;48(10):206–210. http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00056723.htm

For more, check the CDC's Oral Health page [http://www.cdc.gov/oralhealth/index.htm] and their collection of Data Systems [http://www.cdc.gov/oralhealth/data_systems/index.htm]. The latter includes Dental, Oral and Craniofacial Data Resource Center (DRC), My Water's Fluoride, Oral Health Maps, and Synopses.

Posted by pfa at 08:29 PM | Comments (0)

May 26, 2006

Most Requested Dental Statistics

There are two particular statistics I am asked for on a fairly frequent basis -- 1) caries prevalence in various countries; and 2) distribution of dentists comparied to population for various countries. I thought perhaps it would help folks find them more easily if I post them here.

Global Statistics about Caries

WHO Oral Health Country/Area Profile Programme: http://www.whocollab.od.mah.se/index.html

International Statistics about the Dental Workforce

Global Atlas of the Health Workforce: http://www.who.int/globalatlas/DataQuery/default.asp

More International Health Statistics

FYI, WHOSIS, the statistical system from the World Health Organization, is in the process of a substantial change. For a brief time, you can still access both systems.

WHOSIS (WHO Statistical Information System): World Health Statistics 2006: http://www.who.int/whosis/en/

Posted by pfa at 04:10 PM | Comments (0)

April 07, 2006

World Health Day 2006: Working Together for Health

Today is World Health Day, an annual event sponsored primarily by the World Health Organization. This year, the event focuses on a celebration of the health care workers and professionals throughout the world and an acknowledgment of a lack of much needed professional expertise and health care workers in many parts of the world.

World Health Organization (WHO): World Health Day: Working Together for Health: http://www.who.int/world-health-day/2006/en/

"Health workers - the people who provide health care to those who need it - are the heart of health systems. But around the world, the health workforce is in crisis - a crisis to which no country is entirely immune. The results are evident: clinics with no health workers, hospitals that cannot recruit or keep key staff."

Related links from WHO:

Posted by pfa at 11:04 AM | Comments (0)

February 23, 2006

National Practitioner Data Bank

The National Practitioner Data Bank is a resource perhaps best known for its provision of aggregate data on trends in malpractice suits by state and profession. Another common use of the database is to ask for copies of reports on yourself (for practitioners), rather like asking for a copy of your credit report.

This resource is about to change location. It is currently available at:

National Practitioner Data Bank: http://www.npdb-hipdb.com/

"Beginning on May 8, 2006, the Data Bank Web site will be located at www.npdb-hipdb.hrsa.gov. The Data Banks are moving to a .gov domain name to help prevent fraud by showing Data Bank users that the NPDB-HIPDB Web site is under the Government-run domain."

Posted by pfa at 10:42 PM | Comments (0)