Space Stat--Spatial Statistics in Public Health/Medicine

Spatial statistics have been used in the study of lip cancer, disease epidemics, the effects of theenvironment on health, in detecting clustering of rare diseases, and in modeling the growth of canceroustumors. Medical researchers in many areas of public health and medicine often use and work with mapsand associated spatial statistics. In spite of a growing need, there are currently no software packagesproviding a comprehensive suite of easy to use spatial statistics functions. We will developSPACE-STAT, an interactive spatial statistics module for the S-Plus data analysis and graphicsenvironment with an emphasis on techniques and methods of interest to the medical community. Thecombination of SPACE-STAT and DataViewer, StatSci's advanced environment for the visualization,exploration, and analysis of spatial data, will provide powerful tools for medical researchers in theiranalysis of spatial data. The SPACE-STAT module will include exploratory and graphical methods,multiple regression with spatially correlated errors, and methods for analyzing spatial point patterns.Also included are more specialized methods such as the auto-Poisson models, general linear mixedmodels, models for extra-Poisson variation, models and tests for space-time clustering, spatial modelsof tumor growth, and robustified versions when available.