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Cancer Causes Control (2011) 22:631647
DOI 10.1007/s10552-011-9736-5
ORIGINAL PAPER
The California Neighborhoods Data System: a new resource for examining the impact of neighborhood characteristics on cancer incidence and outcomes in populations
Scarlett Lin Gomez Sally L. Glaser Laura A. McClure
Sarah J. Shema Melissa Kealey Theresa H. M. Keegan
William A. Satariano
Received: 7 October 2010 / Accepted: 21 January 2011 / Published online: 12 February 2011 Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
Abstract Research on neighborhoods and health has been growing. However, studies have not investigated the association of specic neighborhood measures, including socioeconomic and built environments, with cancer incidence or outcomes. We developed the California Neighborhoods Data System (CNDS), an integrated system of small area-level measures of socioeconomic and built environments for California, which can be readily linked to individual-level geocoded records. The CNDS includes measures such as socioeconomic status, population density, racial residential segregation, ethnic enclaves, distance to hospitals, walkable destinations, and street connectivity. Linking the CNDS to geocoded cancer patient information from the California Cancer Registry, we demonstrate the variability of CNDS measures by neighborhood socioeconomic status and predominant race/ethnicity for the 7,049 California census tracts, as well as by patient race/ethnicity. The CNDS represents an efcient and cost-effective resource for cancer epidemiology and control. It expands our ability to understand the role of neighborhoods with regard to cancer incidence and outcomes. Used in conjunction with cancer registry data, these additional
contextual measures enable the type of transdisciplinary, cells-to-society research that is now being recognized as necessary for addressing population disparities in cancer incidence and outcomes.
Keywords Neighborhood Socioeconomic environment
Built environment Immigration Contextual factors GIS
Introduction
We now know that like real estate, health is location, location, location. Where you live makes an enormous difference in terms of the air you breathe, the schools you go to, the work, transportation, housing, streets, violence levels, etcetera, that you live with on a day-to-day basis. So unless we create some innovative strategies to fundamentally change the nature of disadvantaged neighborhoods, were in trouble. George Kaplan [1].
A growing body of research [2] is demonstrating that health in human populations [3] is affected by the environment in which we live, including their social [4], socioeconomic, and built [2, 5] aspects (i.e., man-made surroundings that...