NSSP ED Trajectories — fetch & filter (Texas)

Simple Python tools to download the CDC NSSP Emergency Department Visit Trajectories dataset and produce a cleaned Texas extract suitable for Tableau or further analysis.

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What this repo does

• Fetches the NSSP trajectories CSV from CDC (raw export).
• Provides a filtering script that narrows the dataset to Texas (and optionally 2024).
• Includes a small debugger/analysis script for quick testing.

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Files (key)

• nssp_fetch_state_tx.py — fetch raw NSSP CSV (CDC / Socrata), save to outputs/.
• filter_nssp_tx.py — filter the raw CSV to Texas rows and write outputs/nssp_tx_all_years.csv and outputs/nssp_tx_2024.csv.
• nssp_fetch_and_analysis.py — lightweight debugger / analysis runner (used for testing; prints status, runs mini-EDA).
• outputs/ — (generated) directory where CSVs and figures are written.
• README.md — this file.

(If you have other helper scripts in the folder, they’re optional — the three above are the main flow.)

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Requirements

• Python 3.8+ (recommended)
• pip

Packages required:

• pandas
• requests
• numpy
• scikit-learn
• scipy
• matplotlib

Install quickly:

python -m pip install --upgrade pip
python -m pip install pandas requests scikit-learn numpy scipy matplotlib

Or create requirements.txt and install:

pandas
requests
numpy
scikit-learn
scipy
matplotlib

python -m pip install -r requirements.txt

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Quick usage

1. Fetch the CDC NSSP export (raw CSV) — writes into outputs/:

python nssp_fetch_state_tx.py

2. Filter raw CDC export to Texas (and 2024 if available):

python filter_nssp_tx.py

3. Run the debugger / quick analysis (optional):

python nssp_fetch_and_analysis.py

After running the two main scripts you should have outputs/nssp_tx_all_years.csv (and outputs/nssp_tx_2024.csv if 2024 rows exist). Those files are ready for Tableau or downstream analysis.

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Tableau

A live map/dashboard built from a cleaned export is available here:

https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/kevin.malone4673/viz/CourseraCapstone_17617624293390/Dashboard1

Use the nssp_tx_all_years.csv / nssp_tx_2024.csv as the data source in Tableau. Prefer 5-digit FIPS for reliable county mapping.

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Output locations

• outputs/nssp_cdc_raw.csv — raw CDC/Socrata download (saved by fetch script)
• outputs/nssp_tx_all_years.csv — Texas rows (all years)
• outputs/nssp_tx_2024.csv — Texas rows filtered to 2024 (if present)
• outputs/*.png or outputs/figs/ — any plots generated by the debugger/analysis scripts

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Troubleshooting (short)

• ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'matplotlib' — run the pip install command above.
• No rows returned from API for county/state? NSSP sometimes suppresses county-level rows — use the CDC CSV export (Socrata) fetch (the fetch script does this).
• If mapping in Tableau fails, prefer FIPS5 (5-digit FIPS). County name mismatches are common.

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Notes / provenance

• Data source: CDC NSSP Emergency Department Visit Trajectories (Socrata dataset rdmq-nq56). Cite CDC if you publish results.
• These scripts are intended for exploratory / capstone work (Coursera capstone). Not production-grade ETL.

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License & contact

MIT-style (do what you want, please cite the dataset). Questions or want a quick Tableau-ready CSV or sample map exported as PNG? Open an issue or ping me.