Faculty of Science

Objectives

To use epidemiology in evaluating both health services and screening programs.

Contents

Evaluation of health services: Studies of process and outcome; Efficacy, Effectiveness and Efficiency; Evaluation using group data, outcome research; potential biases in evaluating health services using group data; Evaluation using individual data; randomized designs, non randomized designs: Before after designs with historical control, simultaneous non randomized design (program-no program), comparison of utilizers and non-utilizers, comparison of eligible and non-eligible populations, combination design, case control studies

Evaluation of screening programmes: Pattern of disease progression, methodologies issues: selection biases, Lead Time Bias, overdiagnosis bias; study designs for evaluation of screening: randomized and non-randomized studies; problems of assessing the sensitivity and specificity of tests; cost-benefit analysis of screening

Epidemiology and public policy: Population versus high-risk approaches for prevention, risk assessment, assessment of exposure, meta-analysis, publication bias, epidemiology in the courts; policy issues regarding risk

Ethical and Professional Issues in epidemiology: Obligations to study subjects; privacy and confidentiality, Access to data; race and ethnicity in Epidemiologic studies; conflict of interest; interpreting findings