read.dbc: Read Data Stored in DBC (Compressed DBF) Files

In read.dbc: Read Data Stored in DBC (Compressed DBF) Files

Read Data Stored in DBC (Compressed DBF) Files

Description

This function allows you to read a DBC (compressed DBF) file into a data frame. Please note that this is the file format used by the Brazilian Ministry of Health (DATASUS), and it is not related to the FoxPro or CANdb DBC file formats.

Usage

read.dbc(file, ...)

Arguments

file	The name of the DBC file (including extension)
...	Further arguments to be passed to read.dbf

Details

DBC is the extension for compressed DBF files (from the 'XBASE' family of databases). This is a proprietary file format used by the brazilian government to make available public healthcare datasets (by it's agency called DATASUS). read.dbc relies on the dbc2dbf function to decompress the DBC into a temporary DBF file.

After decompressing, it reads the temporary DBF file into a data.frame using read.dbf from the foreign package.

Value

A data.frame of the data from the DBC file.

Note

DATASUS is the name of the Department of Informatics of the Brazilian Health System and is resposible for publishing public healthcare data. Besides the DATASUS, the Brazilian National Agency for Supplementary Health (ANS) also uses this file format for its public data.

This function was tested using files from both DATASUS and ANS to ensure compliance with the format, and hence ensure its usability by researchers.

As a final note, neither this project, nor its author, has any association with the brazilian government.

Author(s)

Daniela Petruzalek, [e-mail]

See Also

dbc2dbf

Examples

# The 'sids.dbc' file is the compressed version of 'sids.dbf' from the "foreign" package.
file <- system.file("files/sids.dbc", package="read.dbc")
sids <- read.dbc(file)
str(sids)
summary(sids)

# This is a small subset of U.S. NOAA storm database.
file <- system.file("files/storm.dbc", package="read.dbc")
storm <- read.dbc(file)
head(storm)
str(storm)

read.dbc documentation built on July 9, 2023, 7:03 p.m.