Read full paper at: http://www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?PaperID=53860#.VNhjAyzQrzE Author(s) Min Lian 1,2 Affiliation(s) 1 Department of Medicine, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri, USA . 2 Alvin J. Siteman Cancer Center, Barnes-Jewish Hospital and Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis, Missouri, USA . ABSTRACT Assessing geographic variations in health events is one of the major tasks in spatial epidemiologic studies. Geographic variation in a health event can be estimated using the neighborhood-level variance that is derived from a generalized mixed linear model or a Bayesian spatial hierarchical model. Two novel heterogeneity measures, including median odds ratio and interquartile odds ratio, have been developed to quantify the magnitude of geographic variations and facilitate the data interpretation. However, the statistical significance of geographic heterogene...
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