Customer Reviews

Applied Spatial Statistics for Public Health Data

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is incredably well-written. Although I had not read a statistics text in 12 years, this book balanced theoretical development, explanation, and examples in such a way that it was actually easy to read. The organization of the book makes looking up a particular topic very easy. The reference list is extensive. The best thing about the book is the set of graphics and maps to illustrate the mathematics, modeling, and outcomes. This book is a must-have for anyone involved in spatial statistics, disease clustering, epidemiology.

This book provides an excellent depth for most users, and manages to cover the material without getting too bogged down.

Although it would be hard work for a beginner to either spatial data or epidemiology, I doubt they would be looking for such a book. It does however cover the topic range from the entry level up to the more complex topics, so makes an excellent text for graduate and postgraduate work.

This is the kind of good book that gives an overview of applications in spatial statistics. It obviously lacks - since it's not a math/stats book - theorems, proofs, and demonstrations, but it does have essential ideas and explores the subject in a very friendly language. If you are in social sciences, don't loose it. If you are in stats, buy some spatial statistics book (Cressie's, for example), and read them together.

Chapter 2 has been written very carefully, and gives the reader important ideas about risk, rate estimation, and the different kinds of data result from different experimental designs. If you bought 'that' spatial stats book, don't bother about chapter 3.

Chapter 4 gives (again) a very careful description, in this case about graphics and spatial data presentation. I'd say it does the job.

From chapter 5 on, you'll need 'the other book' in order to understand what really is at stake.

It could be a little less expensive...