Introduction to Epidemiology: Dr. N. Birkett

Introduction to Epidemiology (EPI 5240)

Schedule of Lectures (FINAL)

This table provides the current schedule of classes for EPI 6276. It also lists the associated sections of the Aschengrau textbook. For more detailed session-specific readings, you should consult the separate material given here. The last two columns of the table provides links to any files which relate to the session (e.g. Power Point slides, if any). For many sessions, there will be no files to download. NOTE: the PPT versions of the files tend to be much bigger than the PDF versions although they both contain the same information. The content of all files is copyrighted to Dr. Birkett.

# Date  Topic  Book ref   Files
1 Sept 14
1300-1600:
Introduction to course. Historical roots of Epidemiology.  Sample vignettes
1600-1700 (optional):
Nova video on investigation of an Ebola outbreak

Chapter 1

 

PPT
Audio:1

PDF
Audio:2
 2

Sept 21

1300-1500:
Disease classification. Vital Statistics.  Measures of Morbidity & Mortality.
1500-1600:
Sources of information.  Disease registries
1600-1700 (optional):
Nova video on esophageal cancer in China

Chapter 2

Chapter 4

 

PPT(A)

PPT(B)

Audio:1

PDF(A)

PDF(B)

Audio:2

 3 Sept 28
1300-1430:
An overview of the primary study designs
1430-1600:
Descriptive Epidemiology

Chapter 6 & 7

Chapter 5

PPT(A)
PPT(B)

Audio:1

PDF(A)
PDF(B)

Audio:2

 4 Oct 5
1300-1500:
Incidence, Prevalence, person-time, etc.
1500-1600:
Comparing disease frequencies in different study designs

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

PPT(A)
PPT(B)

Audio:1

PDF(A)
PDF(B)

Audio:2

Oct 12 NO CLASS (THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY)      
Oct 19
1300-1500:
Overview of concepts of causation & association.
1500-1600:
Study validity and bias.

Chapter 15

Chapter 10

PPT

Audio:1

PDF

Audio:2

 7 Oct 26
1300-1600:
Concepts of Infectious Disease Epidemiology and outbreak investigation:
None

PPT(A)
PPT(B)

Audio:1
Audio:2

PDF(A)
PDF(B)

Audio:
exercise

 8 Nov 2
1300-1500:
Diagnostic test evaluation.  Screening.
1500-1600:
Epidemiological trends in Canada: non-communicable diseases.

Chapter 16

None

PPT(A)
PPT(B)

Audio:1

PDF(A)
PDF(B)

Audio:2

 9 Nov 9
1300-1500:
Bias.  Confounding and effect modification, general concepts
1500-1600:
Misclassification

Chapters 10,11,13

None

PPT(A)
PPT(B)

Audio:1

PDF(A)
PDF(B)

Audio:2

10 Nov 16
1300-1600:
Methods of controlling confounding.  Stratified analyses.  Standardization
Chapter 11, 13

PPT
Example
Summer

Audio:1

PDF

 

Audio:2

11 Nov 23
1300-1500:
Cohort studies.  Methodological standards.  Open and closed populations.  Field work issues.
1500-1600:
Estimating population impact

Chapter 8

None

PPT(A)
PPT(B)

Audio:1

PDF(A)
PDF(B)

Audio:2

12 Nov 30
1300-1600:
Case-control studies.  Principles of case and control selection.  Prevalent vs incident case-control studies.  Matching
Chapter 9

PPT

Audio:1

PDF

Audio:2

13  Dec 7
1300-1600:
Incidence estimation and related topics.  Concepts of survival analysis related to incidence measures.  Types of incidence measures.  Inter-relationship of incidence measures.  The density method.
NONE

PPT

Audio:1

PDF

Audio:2

14  Dec 14
1300-1500:
Special types of case-control studies.
1500-1600:
Conceptual ideas of logistic regression

NONE

NONE

   

Optional Seminars (Wednesday afternoons)

We will be offering students in EPI 5240 the opportunity to participate in threeoptional ‘enrichment’ sessions.  The main purpose of these sessions is to enable small group interaction and discussion, to complement the large and more formal lectures.  The material for these sessions has been chosen to complement the lectures and will not cover core material.  They will also not be formally considered in the evaluation/marking scheme.  However, I encourage students to try and attend these sessions since I believe that they will enrich your learning experience.

The sessions will be offered on Wednesday afternoons, from 1300-1500.  The sessions will be limited to 14 students per week but will be repeated on four consecutive weeks.  Students will be asked to sign-up for a maximum of one session for each topic.

The sessions will take place in room 3233.  All sessions will start at 1300.

Dates  Topic  More information 

Sept 23/30
Oct 7/14

Journal Club: Discussion of recent papers.

Details

Oct 21/28
Nov 4/11

Research Ethics.

Details

Nov 18/25
Dec 2/9

Outbreak Investigation exercise

Details

Tutor notes (read afterworking through the case)

Assignments

The details of the course evaluation methods and assignments are discussed here. The deadline dates for each assignment are:

Assignment #1: October 5, 2009

Assignment #2: November 9, 2009

Assignment #3: December 7, 2009

Final Examination: December 17, 2009 (1300-1600)

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