The Relative Risk Estimation of Pneumonia in Malaysia using Standardized Morbidity Ratio (SMR)

Abstract

Pneumonia is the most serious inflammatory disease of the respiratory system which cause millions of deaths worldwide especially for children under age five and older adults. The numbers of pneumonia cases reported keep on increasing from year to year in Malaysia. Moreover, this type of disease can become outbreak if it is not controlled. Besides using as prevention strategies for a disease risk, statistical modelling of disease mapping can also be used in monitoring as it clearly shows risk areas. The objective of this paper is to estimate the value of relative risk for pneumonia transmission by using Standardized Morbidity Ratio (SMR) method which is the conventional statistic method used in disease mapping and subsequently propose a disease risk map to show the pneumonia risk areas. Pneumonia data in Malaysia is used in estimating the relative risk. The results show that, Terengganu has the highest risk of contracting pneumonia while Pulau Pinang shows the lowest risk.

Keywords

• disease mapping
• pneumonia
• standardized morbidity ratio
• relative risk