Cancer InFocus

Cancer InFocus aggregates and visualizes geographically resolved cancer incidence, mortality, and related social determinants to characterize catchment areas for NCI-designated cancer centers.

Key Features:

• Data Collection and Integration: Uses open-source programming languages and modern data collection techniques to retrieve publicly available data on cancer incidence, mortality, social determinants, and risk factors.
• Geographic Contextualization: Applies analyses to defined catchment areas at the U.S. county level and supports application to any set of U.S. counties.
• Interactive Mapping Applications: Provides two distinct routes for creating interactive online mapping applications to visualize data at multiple geographic levels.
• Automation and Up-to-date Data: Implements automation for routine data updates to maintain current datasets.
• Open Source Collaboration: Distributed in an open-source format to permit collaboration and future enhancements.

Scientific Applications:

• Catchment Area Characterization: Characterizes cancer burden within catchment areas using incidence, mortality, social determinants, and risk factor data.
• Surveillance and Monitoring: Visualizes and monitors cancer incidence and mortality across counties and other geographic levels.
• Disparities Identification: Identifies populations and areas with elevated cancer burden or limited access to care by integrating social determinants and risk factors.
• Research Prioritization and Outreach Planning: Supports prioritization of research and community outreach by highlighting geographic areas of need for NCI-designated cancer centers.

Methodology:

Uses open-source programming languages and modern data collection techniques to gather publicly available data on cancer incidence, mortality, social determinants, and risk factors for U.S. counties; provides two routes to create interactive online mapping applications and includes automation for data updates.