Chapter 4 Flashcards
(25 cards)
What are 3 uses of descriptive epidemiological studies?
- Permit evaluation of trends in health and disease 2. provide a basis for planning, provision, and evaluation of health services 3. identify problems to be studied by analytic methods and suggest areas that may be fruitful for investigation
What is a crude rate?
A summary rate based on the actual number of events in a population over a given period of time
What factors do national health studies look at?
How climate, latitude, and environmental pollution affect the prevalence and incidence of disease across regions within the country
International health studies look at what factors?
How climate, cultural factors, national dietary habits, and access to health care affect disease occurrence
What factors do localized patterns of disease studies look at?
Specific environmental conditions that may exist in a particular geographic area Example: Dengue fever along the Texas-Mexico border
What are cyclic (seasonal) trends?
Increases and decreases in the frequency of a disease or other phenomenon over a period of several years or within a year Example: mortality from pneumonia and influenza (peaks in February)
Descriptive epidemiology provides valuable information for what 3 activities?
Prevention of disease, design of interventions, conduct of additional research
What is a descriptive epidemiology study?
One that is concerned with characterizing the amount and distribution of health and disease within a population
What are 3 types of descriptive epidemiological studies?
Case reports, case series, cross-sectional studies
What are some person variables?
Age, sex, race, ethnicity, SES, marital status, nativity, migration, religion
What is spacial clustering?
Refers to aggregation of events in a geographic region
In epidemiology, does the epidemiologist work to prove or disprove their hypothesis?
No–they either reject or fail to reject the null hypothesis
What is temporal clustering?
Denotes the occurrence of events related to time
What is a cross-sectional study?
A type of investigation that examines the relationship between diseases (or other health-related characteristics) and other variables of interest as they exist in a defined population at one particular time. A type of prevalence study.
What is an adjusted rate?
a rate in which statistical procedures have been applied TO PERMIT FAIR COMPARISONS across populations
What are health disparities?
Differences in the quality, access, and outcome of health, based on socioeconomic status, racial, or other differences.
What is a case series?
A collection of cases of disease (larger than a case report), often grouped consecutively and listing common features/characteristics of affected patients
What is descriptive epidemiology?
A field of epidemiology that classifies the occurrences of disease according to the person (who is affected), place (where the condition occurs), and time (when and over what time period the condition occurred)
What are secular trends?
Gradual changes in the frequency of disease over long time periods Example: yearly suicide rates–firearm-associated suicides decreased, but those by hanging increased.
What are the 4 time variables?
secular trends, cyclic (seasonal) trends, point epidemics, and clustering
What factors do urban-rural difference studies look at?
How urban and rural sections of the United States show variations in morbidity and mortality related to environmental and lifestyle issues. Urban example: lead poisonings in children who live in older buildings Rural example: farming injuries among agricultural workers.
What is a case report?
Account of a single occurrence of a noteworthy health-related incident or of a small collection of such events
What are the 4 place variables?
International, national, urban-rural differences, localized patterns of disease
What is a point epidemic?
The response of a group of people circumscribed in a place to a common source of infection, contamination, or other etiologic factor to which they were exposed almost simultaneously
