Characteristics of Disease Maps of Zoonoses: A Scoping Review and a Recommendation for a Reporting Guideline for Disease Maps

This scoping review investigates the characteristics and reporting of disease maps of zoonoses published in the scientific literature from 2017 to 2018. Two reviewers conducted duplicate screening of titles and abstracts identified from a search in Medline and additional databases. Studies were included if they had a disease map figure describing a zoonotic disease. Map characteristics were extracted and summarized from full-text articles meeting inclusion criteria. The search identified 1666 records. A total of 302 articles meeting eligibility criteria were included, comprising 505 disease maps. While most studies (66%) used maps for descriptive exploratory purposes of identifying and representing spatial patterns visually, disease maps were also used analytically to display the results of geospatial and spatial statistical analyses in studies (34%). Most published disease maps identified in this review were reported without information that could be important for geospatial interpretations and their reproducibility. Specifically, 92% of maps in this review did not report the map projection. The findings from this scoping review support the development of a reporting guideline for thematic disease maps.