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A Study on Data Management and Information Service Related to Environmental Health in Seoul

Author: 
Jong-Seok Won ‧ Hyo-Mi Kim ‧ Sang-Gyoon Kim

Recently, environmental health accidents such as contamination in the village of Jang-Geom have occurred occasionally in Korea. Environmental health accidents have caused the public to be more interested than in the past. Citizens of Seoul are not satisfied with the informations related to environmental health, which they need to prepare for their health problems caused by the environment.

Seoul Metropolitan Government(SMG) has established the comprehensive plan for environemental health in Seoul(CPEHS). In the basis of CPEHS, SMG should make implementation plan by 2022. Indicators are needed to set the target for each program of the future implementation plan. A demand survey is needed for information to be used in indicators, and some principles such as data composition is important.

From the perspective of the principles of data we will present a measure for managing and providing information on environmental health data in Seoul. To do so, we studied as follows:

i) Current Status of Environmental Health Data Management in Seoul

ii) Literature Review on Environmental Health Information

iii) A Survey on the Demand for the Utilization of Environmental Health Data

iv) A Measure on the Management and Service of Environmental Health Data in Seoul

The results of this study led us to the following conclusions for Seoul Metropolitan Goverment(SMG):

ⅰ) The data necessary for the establishment of the environmental health implementation plan of Seoul should be collected systematically. In the future, additional information demand surveys will be conducted to construct data expandably, and spatial analysis of environmental health data will be carried out and its utilization performance will be reflected in the direction of data construction.

ⅱ) For systematic utilization of environmental health information, we propose the establishment of digital archives of environmental health information in Seoul. The history of data used in establishing the environmental health action plan, information to be constructed through the demand survey, environmental health indicators, policy performance monitoring result etc. is integrated.

ⅲ) The information needs of citizens should be satisfied efficiently through the provision of customized environmental health information, considering locality, gender perception, asymmetry of information, and reliable information accessibility. Data is processed for the citizens suffering the environmental health related damage or the vulnerable class with difficult access to information. In order to prevent the stigma effect caused by indiscriminate publication, the amendment of the Ordinance shall be improved for the relevant committee to effectively deliberate on the disclosure of environmenatl health information citizens want.

ⅳ) Considering limitations of the budget and the manpower, Citizens' Health Bureau in SMG should actively utilize the regional environmental health center and the national environmental health information system. In the long run, the Seoul Metropolitan Government should develop its own environmental health information system, which will increase its usability and gradually build and provide data by focusing on common use data.