“What makes this conference such a valuable experience is the mix of academics and practitioners, experienced GIS professionals and younger public health staff, with students from a variety of disciplines as well. While the trainings, lectures and presentations add to one’s knowledge, the real perk of the conference for me is the interactions that occur during scheduled breaks and over dinner and evening activities. I came away from the last conference in Providence very inspired, and developed a new graduate seminar in Spatial Perspectives in Community and Family Health at my university in part as a result of the conference.” Russell Kirby, PhD, MS, FACE - University of South Florida

The conference was developed primarily from submissions received through the Call for Abstracts. More than 80 abstracts were received. Two preconference workshops will be presented:

• Introduction to Public Participation GIS (PPGIS): Using GIS to Support Community Decision-Making (URISA-Certified Workshop)

• Tools for Common Challenges in Public Health GIS: Aggregation, Smoothing and Masking

In addition to the twenty-one comprehensive educational sessions on topics ranging from “Using Mapping to Assess Community Health Risk” to “Applications in GIS and Remote Sensing for Environmental Health”, three keynote speakers will be featured:

• Geomedicine: A Patient's Perspective – presented by Bill Davenhall, Global Manager - Health and Human Services, Esri

• GIScience in Public Health: Chagas' Disease, Dengue and West Nile Virus – presented by Dr. Gonzalo M. Vazquez-Prokopec, Research Scientist, Department of Environmental Studies, Emory University

• GIS and Health: Where Can We Go from Here? – presented by Dr. Ellen K. Cromley, Assistant Clinical Professor, Department of Community Medicine and Health Care, University of Connecticut School of Medicine

The poster session is a key part of the conference with nearly 30 participants to date. Exhibits and networking events round out the conference experience.

For complete conference, exhibits, travel and registration information, visit http://www.urisa.org/2011health today.