Tag Archives: Data Visualization

Why It’s Useful to Show the Incidence Rate per 10K or per 100K Population Instead of Just Number of Cases

Posted on by

Incidence rates, or the rates of new cases of a disease, are often shown as the rate per either 100,000 population or per 10,000 population, and provide valuable additional insight to the number of new cases of the disease.

In scenarios when comparing the incidence of a disease across different localities that have varying different sizes in population, looking at the incidence rate of that disease per 10,000 or per 100,000 population helps to show a more complete picture than would only looking at the number of new cases alone.

Examples are given in the quick, 3 minute video below to further illustrate this point.

In conclusion, showing the incidence rate per 10,000 or per 100,000 population provides additional valuable insight in addition to showing the number of new cases of the disease. This is especially true when comparing the incidence rate of the disease across different localities that have varying sizes in populations. In addition, looking at the incidence rate per population is essential when comparing that rate to a state or national average for that disease or comparing it to a benchmark or goal that is in the format of an incidence rate per population.

Visualizing Population Data & Change in Population in Tableau

Posted on by

Population data and the percent change in population are two demographic measures that are great to look at for a variety of different reasons.

There are many different ways to visualize these two measures, depending what it is that you want to learn from this data or show to others in a presentation. In this post and in the video we demonstrate two different ways to do so using Tableau.

One way is to display the population data on a map. This is helpful especially if geography is important to what you are working on with this population data. For example if you are presenting different population sizes of different cities to a group of stakeholders who are not familiar with the locations of those cities or how far away or close to each other they are, then visualizing this on a map for them can help show this to them.

The percent change in population can also be visualized on a map. However, a better way to show percent change in population could be a bar graph.

The second way to display population data is with a bar graph, such as the bar graph shown in the video below for population change in 5 East Coast cities of Atlanta, Boston, New York City, Richmond (VA), and Washington D.C.

As you can see in the video, the interactive bar graph created using Tableau makes it easier to see which city had the greatest population change over the two five year periods looked at in this data set. 

Three Minute Tuesday Videos by RILLIAN, a consulting agency, briefly cover a topic in approximately 3 minutes or less. These videos are provide brief overviews of topics that are useful for anyone working in the areas of Research & Insights Leading to Learning, Innovation, And actioN (R.I.L.L.I.A.N.).

Are there any helpful tips you would like to add about visualizing population data or population change data in Tableau?

Do you have any suggestions for topics you would like to see us cover in our Three Minute Tuesday videos?

Email Jillian at Jillian.Regan@RILLIANconsulting.com .