GIS has become extremely useful in understanding the bigger picture of the public health. While traditional uses of GIS in public health are continuing, but with them new uses of GIS are also growing.
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and the accompanying methods and data have been adopted increasingly in diverse health-related domains and national settings with the goal of improved response to public health problems. The use of geospatial technologies and spatiotemporal epidemiological tools is increasing around the world as a means to understand the dynamics of infectious disease transmission and non-communicable disease distribution.
GIS visualizes health data over time to assist with making policy decisions, setting goals, and evaluating outcomes by linking health data with socio-demographic, environmental, administrative, and healthcare and services infrastructure. Health care organizations can use GIS to improve management practices. Linking the physical location and condition of equipment or supplies in a large facility or distributed medical campus is a powerful new management tool.
Some of the latest applications of GIS in public health are:
- Public Health Infrastructure Mapping
- Research Tools & Planning
- Spatial Decision Support System
- Identification of Risk Location
- Emergency Response Systems
- Managing the emergency time
Use of GIS in Public Health is an application area still in its infant stage.