Citation

Ransome Y, Subramanian SV, Duncan DT, Vlahov D, Warren J. Spat. Spatiotemporal Epidemiol. 2020; 32: e100306.

Affiliation

Department of Biostatistics, Yale School of Public Health, New Haven, CT 06510, United States.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020, Elsevier Publishing)

DOI

10.1016/j.sste.2019.100306

PMID

32007280

Abstract

Drug- and alcohol-poisoning deaths remain current public health problems. Studies to date have typically focused on individual-level predictors of drug overdose deaths, and there remains a limited understanding of the spatiotemporal patterns and predictors of the joint outcomes. We use a hierarchical Bayesian spatiotemporal multivariate Poisson regression model on data from (N = 167) ZIP-codes between 2009 and 2014 in New York City to examine the spatiotemporal patterns of the joint occurrence of drug (opioids) and alcohol-poisoning deaths, and the covariates associated with each outcome.

RESULTS indicate that rates of both outcomes were highly positively correlated across ZIP-codes (cross-correlation: 0.57, 95% credible interval (CrI): 0.29, 0.77). ZIP-codes with a higher prevalence of heavy drinking had higher alcohol-poisoning deaths (relative risk (RR):1.63, 95% CrI: 1.26, 2.05) and drug-poisoning deaths (RR: 1.29, 95% CrI: 1.03, 1.59). These spatial patterns may guide public health planners to target specific areas to address these co-occurring epidemics.

Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Language: en

Keywords

Alcohol; Drug overdose; Multivariate; Poverty; Spatiotemporal