Early last month, the Washington Post ran an article about a developing field of medicine called Geomedicine - an effort to relate location to patterns of illness. Specific to the endeavor reported on by the Post, researchers at Madison, Wisconsin based Asthmapolis have created an asthma inhaler with a GPS device that reports the location of use. Through this approach, it's hoped that if environmental conditions are responsible for the asthma attack, that relationship can be determined from a database of reports from various users. More below:
(Washington Post, February 4, 2013)
Asthmapolis Web Site
Asthmapolis Web Site
Comment: This is a very significant development because it is on the cutting edge of bringing location granularity to the field of medicine. For much too long, it's been a sector of society that has been superb at reporting "what", and not so hot at reporting "where". One need only review the flu map by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to find proof of that point.
Lead graphic: Asthmapolis
Interesting update
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