Medical Geography
GEOG 540
George Mason University

Department of Geography
Spring Semester, 2008
Lecture and lab: Monday 7:20-10:00 PM
Innovation Room 330 		Lee De Cola
US Geological Survey
521 National Center, Reston VA 20192
LDECOLA@USGS.GOV
703 648 4178

Course Description

Objectives— by the end of the course you should:
  • Have a grasp of the basic concepts of epidemiology, public health, and environmental change from a spatial perspective.
  • Be able to discuss major current health topics from microbiological to global scales.
  • Have basic skills in spatial and temporal data management, description, and analysis.
  • Be able to conduct, present, and disseminate online original research

    Prerequisites: A course in statistics
    Text: Gatrell, Anthony C., 2002 Geographies of health: an introduction Malden MA: Blackwell.
    Software: Although experience with none of these is required, we will be using:
        Microsoft Excel
        ESRI ArcGIS (will be distributed at the beginning of the semester)
        HTML editing (e.g. Nvu)
        graphics (MS Paint will do the job)

    Topics to be covered include:

    Public health
    The geography of health demand and supply, with a focus on disparities
    Symbiosis as a model of health at multiple scales
    Models of transmission, exposure, diffusion, contagion
    The role of the physical environment in biological and regional health
    Special issues: biodefense, global/climate change, network theory
    Geographic techniques
    Locating and managing spatially and temporally referenced data
    Visualizing health and environmental data
    Exploring spatial variation and causality
    Modeling the location of health services

    Assignments and Grading
    60% Three assignments
    40    Final project: An original report produced online and presented in class
    100% TOTAL
    Grade will be based on an evaluation of the quality of work according to the formula:
    >94 = A, >89 = A– , >84 = B+, >79 = B, <80 = C.

    2008-01-31