MI5000:03
Epidemiology
Townsville
36 lectures, 6 tutorials, 48 hours practicals and assignments. First semester.
Staff: Assoc. Professor D Copeman.
The subject includes a consideration of terms and methods used to describe the occurrence of disease; the concept and measurement of cause and effect; factors affecting validity and types of choice of diagnostic tests; the design and interpretation of clinical trials and economics of disease. Practical classes will be conducted on the application of biostatistical software which supports these topics.
Learning Objectives:
- understand the often complex patterns of cause and effects of disease;
- know sources of epidemiological data and how to describe and prepare such data for analysis and presentation;
- be able to apply basic exploratory and inferential statistical methods to biomedical data using statistical software;
- be able to design and analyse the results of sampling for disease, surveys, case control studies and cohort studies and clinical trials using within and between subject, factorial and repeated measure designs;
- be aware of sources of bias in designing biomedical experiments and interpreting data;
- know the economic measures applied to assessing costs and benefits of disease control.
Assessment by a three-hour end of semester examination (50%); tutorial and practical assignments (50%).