Posted by PS A copy of this post is now as a tab on my webpage here.
History and Purpose
I’ve been working in the healthcare field, both directly as a clinician and in a managed care company, for well over a decade. While I work regularly with healthcare data at work, I quickly realized that in the larger Tableau Community, there was few examples of people using healthcare data to test their data analytic and dashboard design skills.
I realize that using unfamiliar data is an excellent way to challenge your skills and capabilities in analyzing data to find stories, but I also think that it’s important to use data you are somewhat familiar with in order to really determine if you can use a new skill, technique, design feature, or method of storytelling with the type of data you use regularly at work.
#ProjectHealthViz grew out of a need a saw in the Tableau Community. Healthcare is a huge topic around the world as costs of healthcare rise and various illness continue to see increased prevalence rates. We are all impacted by health. Health is part of being a living being. Therefore, I believe we all can be impacted by healthcare data and thus it can be interesting data to visualize.
Additionally, it’s important for me to create a community of Tableau users in the healthcare field. I’ve appreciated in the past other community members who have shared their work-related dashboards. I find it helpful to see how others are visualizing similar data as I am. This project is also an effort to create a resource for Tableau users in healthcare to seek out each other and share visualizations.
Project Structure
Each month a new data set is shared around the 1st of the month. This means there will be 12 opportunities to participate each year.
The time frame is a month simply because I’m a busy mom and I simply don’t have time for a more frequent project structure. Additionally, there are so many other weekly community data initiatives, that I think we all have plenty of opportunities to participate in weekly ones if desired.
At the end of the month I will attempt to review and organize all of the submissions into my blog which I will post in the following month around mid-month.
The Data
I post the data to data.world. Each month has a separate project where you can find the data set (in the ‘data sets’ section on the right side of the page) as well as post an image of your viz and a link to the interactive version in the Discussion section.
You use the following markdown text in order to post your image and link:
[Interactive Viz](replace this text between the brackets with a link to your interactive viz)
If you come across data you think would be good for the project, don’t hesitate to email me to inform me of data. Just be sure it’s publicly available or you have the rights to share it. Remember, no PHI! Let’s not get anyone in trouble.
How to Participate
- Follow me on Twitter (@ZenDollData) and/or on data.world so you see when I post the new data.
- Connect to the data through Tableau or another visualization software (I don’t discriminate – use whatever software you want).
- Viz away!
- When you are done with your viz, please post it to data.world’s discussion page for the month’s project. This helps so I don’t have to search through Twitter for the submissions.
- If you wish, post to Twitter as well using the hashtag #ProjectHealthViz and tag me in your Tweet so I’m sure to see it. I love seeing what everyone comes up with!
- Lastly, if you want feedback, just mention it. Myself, and I’m sure any other Tableau Community member will be happy to provide feedback.
- Remember, the point is to have fun, to tell the story of our health, to increase the number of healthcare-related vizzes, and develop a community of people to support one another.
If you have any additional questions, please reach out!
Cheers,
Lindsay
Viz Zen Data 