2021•Journal of Clinical and Translational ScienceOpen access
A distributed geospatial approach to describe community characteristics for multisite studies
Patrick Ryan, Cole Brokamp, Jeff Blossom, Nathan Lothrop, Rachel L. Miller, Paloma I. Beamer, Cynthia M. Visness, Antonella Zanobetti, Howard Andrews, Leonard B. Bacharier, Tina V. Hartert, Christine Cole Johnson, Dennis R. Ownby, Robert F. Lemanske, Heike Gibson, Weeberb J. Réquia, Brent A. Coull, Edward M. Zoratti, Anne L. Wright, Fernando D. Martínez, Christine M. Seroogy, James E. Gern, Diane R. Gold
Abstract
Understanding place-based contributors to health requires geographically and culturally diverse study populations, but sharing location data is a significant challenge to multisite studies. Here, we describe a standardized and reproducible method to perform geospatial analyses for multisite studies. Using census tract-level information, we created software for geocoding and geospatial data linkage that was distributed to a consortium of birth cohorts located throughout the USA. Individual sites performed geospatial linkages and returned tract-level information for 8810 children to a central site for analyses. Our generalizable approach demonstrates the feasibility of geospatial analyses across study sites to promote collaborative translational research.