Neighborhoods are complex systems with spatial signals that help decode their stories. We integrate innovative GIScience, public health, and statistical approaches to explore, understand, and promote healthy places.
Research Program Themes
1.
Defining how place impacts & interacts with health
We focus on complexity surrounding the measurement, mapping, and distillation of multiple health outcomes and associated social determinants of health at varying scales, to gain a greater understanding of disease prevalence.
2.
Identifying disparities of access & health outcomes
In collaboration with clinical and public health teams, we explore the relationship of accessibility as a function of health outcomes, from food access disparities to availability of evidence-based medications for opioid use disorder.
3.
Building engaged, participatory infrastructures
We collaborate with policymakers, community members, researchers, and software engineers to brainstorm ways of integrating complex information about the natural, social, health, & built environments — using human-centered design thinking.
4.
Integrating spatial thinking in research design
Spatial effects can violate core components of the standard counterfactual framework used for evaluation, making treatment effects difficult to assess. We refine and improve methods to consider & account for spatial interactions.
Select Research Projects
Since early 2020, we’ve made spatial statistics accessible in the web browser, encouraging users to explore the pandemic from its start to today. In the latest push, we’re humanizing the data with oral histories from across the country. We also explore how regional social determinants of health impact COVID.
Place and Social-Spatial Networks
We have multiple projects exploring how neighborhood connections between people can be better understood to prioritize places, individuals, or groups for life-saving and harm-reducing health interventions.
Measuring Opioid Risk Environments
We are the geospatial core leads at the JCOIN Methodology and Advanced Analytics Resource Center, and collaborate with many other teams to measure opioid risk environments, access to medication for opioid use disorder, and implement quasi-experimental research designs to evaluate spatial impacts.
Decision Supports for Environmental Justice
A handful of key metrics―tree cover, air pollution estimates, heat island effects, traffic volumes, and social vulnerability index― help to reveal where in the city people face particular challenges. Following years of collaboration with different groups, we’re now fine-tuning ChiVes to support community efforts.
Latest News from HeRoP Lab
-
April Speaker Series: Humanities for Health
Humanities for Health: Graphic Public Health & the Environment Robin McCrary PhD, Syracuse University Friday, April 26th @ Noon, via Zoom & In-Person at NHB 2049 in Urbana, IL Join us for lunch, learning, and conversation at the next installment of the HEROP Speaker Series on Friday, April 26th at noon. Coffee and networking session… Read more
-
Seeking SDOH Data Super Users
Do you use social determinants of health (SDOH) data on neighborhoods or communities in your research, advocacy work, and/or classroom? We are developing an “SDOH Super User Group” to learn more about current practices and existing challenges of accessing SDOH data across a wide range of applications. Read more
-
Be a Part of Environmental & Climate Justice in Chicago
Be a part of Climate & Environmental Justice in Chicago! Join the team to design & expand ChiVes, a NASA-funded project connecting data on the environment with neighborhoods. Add your and your community’s own stories, photos, events, news and more to the project.Add your own imprint. Co-designers receive $25+ per workshop and can also earn… Read more
-
February Speaker Series: Wildfire Smoke & How it Affects our Health
Wildfire Smoke & How it Affects our Health Colleen E. Reid, Ph.D., U of Colorado BoulderFriday, Feb 23rd @ 3 PM CST,via Zoom & In-Person at NHB 2049 in Urbana, IL Join us for snacks, learning, and conversation at the next installment of the HEROP Speaker Series on Friday, Februart 23rd at 3 PM. Coffee… Read more
-
January Speaker Series: Microbiomes & One Health
Microbiomes and One Health: Exploring the Importance of Microbial Communities for Environmental and Host Health Sierra Raglin, Ph.D., U of Illinois at Urbana-ChampaignFriday, Jan 26th @ Noon,via Zoom & In-Person at NHB 2049 in Urbana, IL Join us for lunch, learning, and conversation at the next installment of the HEROP Speaker Series on Friday, January… Read more
-
December Speaker Series: The Air We Breathe
The Air We Breathe: Partnering to Measure Air Quality in Cicero, IL. Dillon Bergin, MuckRock Foundation & Irene Romulo, Cicero Independiente Friday, December 8th at Noon CST, via Zoom & In-Person at NHB 2049 Join us for learning and conversation at the next installment of the HEROP Speaker Series on Friday, December 8th at noon.… Read more
Looking for a research experience?
Our team is fully staffed! We are not hiring new staff or UIUC student hourly researchers at this time. To get on the waitlist, contact us with your interest and resume.
The Healthy Regions & Policies Lab is supported in part by the following organizations.
Healthy Regions & Policies Lab 