-------- Original Message --------
Subject:        [Fwd: No Place to Hide — Reverse Identification of Patients
from Published Maps]
Date:   Wed, 18 Oct 2006 17:38:16 -0400
From:   Joel Kovarsky <[log in to unmask]>
To:     [log in to unmask]



This is a link
(http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/short/355/16/1741?query=TOC) to the
article from: _New England Journal of Medicine_
Volume 355:1741-1742            October 19, 2006
<http://content.nejm.org/content/vol355/issue16/index.shtml>            Number 16


It does require a subscription or database access. The point of the
article is the problems with personal privacy invasion by modern types
of medical mapping. Here is the concluding statement from the short
piece by John S. Brownstein, PhD, Children's Hospital, Boston, MA USA:

    " The publication of maps of disease with precise locations of^
    patients jeopardizes patients' privacy. Guidelines for the display^
    or publication of health data are needed to guarantee patients'^
    anonymity.^4
    <http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/355/16/1741#R4> A common
    approach has been to map according to administrative^ unit rather
    than home address. However, the aggregation of data^ in this manner
    places constraints on the visualization of disease^ patterns.
    Another method is spatial skewing, or randomly relocating^ patients'
    addresses within a given distance of their true location.^ Skewing
    can allow a visualization that conveys the necessary^ information
    while preserving patients' privacy.^5
    <http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/355/16/1741#R5> Both
    aggregation^ and skewing are systematic and reliable means of
    de-identification^ that are far safer, in terms of protecting
    identifiable health^ information, than simply reducing the
    resolution of a map. Editors^ of journals and textbooks should
    consider implementing such^ policies to guide the safe reporting of
    spatial data."

I thought this was appropriate for this list, given some prior
discussions of medical mapping.

                   Joel Kovarsky