A GEOGRAPHIC INFORMATION-SYSTEM APPLIED TO A MALARIA FIELD-STUDY IN WESTERN KENYA

This paper describes use of the global positioning system (GPS) in dif ferential mode (DGPS) to obtain highly accurate longitudes, latitudes, and altitudes of 1,169 houses, 15 schools, 40 churches, four health c art: centers, 48 major mosquito breeding sites, IO borehole wells, sev en shopping areas, major roads, streams, the shore of Lake Victoria, a nd other geographic features of interest associated with a longitudina l study of malaria in 15 villages in western Kenya. The area mapped en compassed approximately 70 km(2) and included 42.0 km of roads, 54.3 k m of streams, and 15.0 km of lake shore. Location data were entered in to a geographic information system for map production and Linkage with various databases for spatial analyses. Spatial analyses using parasi tologic and entomologic data are presented as examples. Background inf ormation on DGPS is presented along with estimates of effort and expen se to produce the nap information.