NCI Awards Contract for Geographic Information System To Support Breast Cancer Research on Long Island

National Cancer Institute
Friday, 7 May 1999

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) announced today the award of a contract to AverStar, Inc., of Vienna, Va., to develop and implement a prototype geographic information system (GIS) for breast cancer studies as part of the Long Island Breast Cancer Study Project (LIBCSP). The contract award is for $4,872,309 for Phase 1 (two years) and Phase 2 (three option years). Phase I is to develop and deliver the GIS system, and Phase 2 is for system maintenance and data expansion to respond to research needs.

"The Long Island geographic information system provides the opportunity to apply a powerful emerging technology to the study of environmental causes of breast cancer," said G. Iris Obrams, M.D., Ph.D., associate director of NCI's Epidemiology and Genetics Research Program (EGRP), Division of Cancer Control and Population Sciences (DCCPS). "This prototype GIS will be the first such system developed to study relationships between environmental exposures and breast cancer, and will provide researchers a new tool with which to conduct their investigations."

GISs are powerful computer systems that can store, manipulate, analyze, and display the spatial (geographic location) relationships between dissimilar data types. They provide a tool to study potential relationships between the location of breast cancer cases and sources of air or water pollution. The systems have been in development for more than 20 years, but only with recent advances in computer hardware, software, and increased availability of geo-coded health and environmental data (data tagged to location on the earth's surface) have they come into use in public health protection.

The LIBCSP is a multistudy effort to investigate whether environmental factors are responsible for breast cancer in Suffolk, Nassau, and Schoharie counties, N.Y., and in Tolland County, Conn. The investigation began in 1993 under Public Law 103-43 and is funded and coordinated by the NCI, in collaboration with the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). The Public Law includes development of a GIS for Long Island.

The GIS data layers will include geographic data for general mapping purposes and demographic data. Data on health care facilities, health care surveys, breast cancer, and the environment will also be included. The environmental data will include information on contaminated drinking water; sources of indoor and ambient air pollution, including emissions from aircraft; electromagnetic fields; pesticides and other toxic chemicals; hazardous and municipal waste; and radiation. The system will rely chiefly on existing databases obtained from federal, state, and local governments, and private sources, with emphasis placed on high-quality data. The Long Island community will also be asked to provide descriptive information about the environment and history of the area.

"The geographic information system for Long Island will be modular, flexible, and expandable so that it can be adapted to research needs. As additional exposure data become available, they can be added to allow researchers to explore important exposure-disease relationships," said Ellen Heineman, Ph.D., NCI project officer for the contract. "The quality of the data is crucial so that investigators and the public can have confidence in research findings that are based on the system."

Although some of the data to be included in the GIS are publicly available, other data are confidential or proprietary, such as medical records. As a result, various levels of access to the GIS will be established to safeguard data while maximizing the system's usefulness as a research tool. This will ensure that individual records remain confidential.

A Web site will be available through which the public and researchers will be able to obtain information on the progress of the GIS's development and summary information about the databases.

Use and access to the system will be guided by an oversight committee. The membership will be made up of members of the established Ad Hoc Advisory Committee to the LIBCSP, which includes scientists and community representatives; as well as federal, state, and local government specialists; external consultants; and additional representation from the Long Island community. The committee will advise NCI on policies and procedures, review the system's operations, and review and approve research proposals from investigators to use the GIS.

For more information, or to contact National Cancer Institute, see their website at: www.cancer.gov