(page number not for citation purposes) International Journal of Health

Background: We consider how representations of geographic variation in prostate cancer incidence across Southern New England, USA may be affected by selection of study area and/or properties of the statistical analysis. Method: A spatial scan statistic was used to monitor geographic variation among 35,167 incident prostate cancer cases diagnosed in Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island from 1994 to 1998, in relation to the 1990 populations of men 20+ years of age living in that region. Results from the combined-states analysis were compared to those from single-states. Impact of scanning procedures set to examine up to 50 % or no more than10 % of at-risk populations also was evaluated