Skip to main content
AMCA25 Main banner
Final Program


Icon Legend
This session is not in your schedule.
This session is in your schedule. Click again to remove it.
Back

Application of GIS for Vector Control and Surveillance

Application of GIS for Vector Control and Surveillance

220 - Using Smarter Tools to Strengthen Mosquito Control Strategies in Chicago, 2023

Thursday, March 6, 2025
8:50 AM – 9:00 AM AST
Location: 202
Abstract:

Background: The Chicago Department of Public Health (CDPH) has been treating catch basins to reduce adult mosquitos since 2002. In recent years, the need for access to real-time data and an evaluation of data quality were identified. A pilot project was conducted between May-July 2023 to compare the current system for collecting treatment data using a handheld Garmin GPS device to the ArcGIS QuickCapture application on a smart device.





Methods: A sample of catch basin treatment GPS coordinates were electronically recorded simultaneously on the two devices by the same person. Data from both devices were spatially compared to known city catch basin locations using a grid cell geography in ArcGIS Pro. Grid cells containing coordinates from both devices were analyzed.





Results: The pilot area included 1,232 grid cells. The range of coordinates captured in each cell for the smart device (1-29) was closer to the expected number of catch basins per cell (0-33) than the Garmin device (1-49). Compared to the coordinate counts for catch basins, the smart device had 547 (44.4%) grid cell totals within a 3-count difference versus 601 (48.8%) from the Garmin device. The smart device had more undercounting in grid cells (80.9% vs 73.7%) but reduced overcounting (11.9% vs 16.3%) compared to the Garmin device. Examining cells with low concordance revealed potential sources of human and measurement error, including delayed coordinate recording on Garmin devices, inaccurate manual coordinate recording and overlap in treatment areas.





Conclusions: Accurate, complete and timely data are needed to provide targeted vector control interventions. While the GPS and smart devices produced similar results, incorporating the QuickCapture application into CDPH’s data collection process can provide more benefits and minimize errors. Having real-time data available can better inform operations, improve completeness, reduce duplicative efforts and ultimately provide quality data for evaluation purposes.