Applications of Geographic Information System (GIS) in health domain: Viewpoints of students and faculties of Bandar Abbas Health School

  This paper investigates Geographic Information System (GIS)awareness and perception among students and lectures of health school of Hormozgan University of Medical Sciences (HUMS). This descriptive study was conducted in 2013-2014. Research population were 162 consisted of 150 students and 12 lectures of health school of HUMS. Data were collected from questionnaire instrument which included information related to research purposes, To standardize and validate the questionnaire, qualitative assessment was done using an expert Reliability assessment was done by a Cronbach's alpha. The collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and SPSS version 16 software. Fisher's exact test showed that there were significant differences between the two groups of professors and students in awareness and knowledge to application of GIS in the health sector (P = 0.029). Although the mean score of the both groups of lectures and students and the total score of the questions were lower than the mean score. Between the awareness of students and lectures and the application of GIS in the how to provide health services and facilities available were a significant difference (P = 049).

The results show that knowledge of both groups was low, probably to the lack of educational training programs in universities, health groups and short courses on Geographic Information System. According to the numerous applications in the planning of the health system educational and practical education is essential in medical universities.