OpenStreetMap data for alcohol research: Reliability assessment and quality indicators. (March 2018)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Bright, Jonathan; De Sabbata, Stefano; Lee, Sumin; Ganesh, Bharath; Humphreys, David K.
• Is Part Of: Health & place. Volume 50(2018:Mar.)
• Page Start: 130
• Page End: 136
• Publication Date: 2018-03
• Subjects: Alcohol availability -- Alcohol licensing -- Alcohol-related harm -- OpenStreetMap -- Big data; Health -- Social aspects -- Periodicals; Health services accessibility -- Periodicals; Public health -- Periodicals; Political planning -- Periodicals; Social medicine -- Periodicals; Epidemiology -- Periodicals; Health Policy -- Periodicals; Health Services Accessibility -- Periodicals; Public Health -- Periodicals; Public Policy -- Periodicals; Sociology, Medical -- Periodicals; Épidémiologie -- Périodiques; Politique sanitaire -- Périodiques; Santé, Services de -- Accessibilité -- Périodiques; Health services accessibility; Health -- Social aspects; Political planning; Public health; Social medicine; Periodicals; 613
• DOI: 10.1016/j.healthplace.2018.01.009
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1353-8292

Abstract

Abstract: There is a growing interest in using OpenStreetMap [OSM] data in health research. We evaluate the usefulness of OSM data for researching the spatial availability of alcohol, a field which has been hampered by data access difficulties. We find OSM data is about 50% complete, which appears adequate for replicating findings from other studies using alcohol licensing data. Further, we show how OSM quality metrics can be used to select areas with more complete alcohol data. The ease of access and use may create opportunities for analysts and researchers seeking to understand broad patterns of alcohol availability. Highlights: We assess the reliability of OpenStreetMap data for estimating spatial availability of alcohol. We show that OSM contains about 50% of actually existing alcohol points of sale. We duplicate a previous study of alcohol related harms using OSM data. We use OSM quality metrics to select areas of higher quality data. We conclude that OSM is a useful supplementary data source for researchers.