台灣地理資訊系統於公共衛生之研究與應用

Research and Application of Geographic Information Systems in Public Health in Taiwan

近年來應用地理資訊系統（GIS），輔助處理公共衛生的空間資料，已經成為趨勢。目前GIS不僅在公共衛生領域的研究已經獲得學界的肯定，更有一些公共衛生的主管機關開始重視其應用價值，投入了大量的資源，建立醫療空間資料庫與應用系統。然而，在國內關心這個課題的研究人員雖然日益增多，卻分散在不同的領域，至今還沒有明確地整合過。本文為了瞭解這個新興的研究領域，嚐試從國內的各類期刊、博碩士論文，及相關網站等資訊，來整理國內各領域利用GIS從事公共衛生的研究與發展。本文主要分三個部分來回顧；第一部分簡要地探討國內外應用GIS於公共衛生之研究；第二部分再說明當前公共衛生空間資料庫之發展；第三部分進一步以兩個議題檢視國內將GIS運用於公共衛生領域之研究與應用；其一是疾病地圖之繪製與傳染流行病之疫情防治；其二則是醫療資源的分配與緊急醫療網之設置。從上述這些整合過的研究領域顯示，在國內的學術界中，主要還是以地理學、流行病學與環境相關領域的學者參與最多。除了學術界已經將GIS運用於公共衛生之研究外，政府機構也透過衛生署與各縣市政府的疾病管制局積極在建置GIS系統，做好公共衛生的管理。因此，帶動了很多GIS產業界的參與，協助完成各種空間資訊的疾病防治系統。這種GIS於公共衛生在產、官、學多元化的發展，有助益國內疾病防治與預防，但尚有一些資料結構與供應，及空間分析模式等瓶頸有待共同克服。

There is an increasing trend towards applying Geographical Information Systems (GIS) to analyze spatial information concerning public health in recent years. Currently, GIS not only gains its recognition among public health researchers as a powerful analytical tool, the value of its application also attracts attentions from the government officials, and thus invest a lots of resources to establish data base and application systems regarding the spatial aspects of medical information. However, the growing research manpower concerned with GIS application scatters among various fields and has not yet been integrated in Taiwan. This paper will address this new emerging research field by collecting information from domestic journals, master theses, Ph. D. dissertations and related websites in order to analyze how different fields applying GIS to study and manage public health issues in Taiwan. This paper is divided into three parts. First, a brief review of GIS in the public health studies is presented. Second, an introduction of the contemporary development of the spatial database in public health. Lastly, two issues regarding the adoption of GIS in domestic research and management in public health are discussed. One will consider disease mapping and the control and prevention of epidemic disease. The other will focus on the distribution of medical resources and the establishment of an emergency medicine net. Preliminary results from this study show that the researchers involved are mainly from geography, epidemiology and environmental studies. This research shows that not only the academic has implemented GIS in public health studies, the Department of Health, Executive Yuan, and the Centers for Disease Control also endorse city and county governments to incorporate GIS into their managerial and inquiry systems. As a result, private companies which sale GIS software and/or services are actively involved in the construction of the disease control and prevention system.