SMED8002 - Epidemiology II

Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences

Course content

Study design, measures of disease occurrence, measures of effect, intern validity, Directed acyclic graphs (DAGs), interpretation of multivariable models, causal inference, causal interaction and effect measure modification, screening, instrumental variable estimation, family designs, case only designs.

Learning outcome

After completing SMED8002, the student will have:

Knowledge:

• Knowledge of various study designs commonly used in population-based and clinical research (cross-sectional studies, cohort studies, case-control studies, and randomized controlled trials).
• Understanding of different measures of disease occurrence (prevalence, incidence rate, and incidence proportion).
• Knowledge about screening.

Skills:

• Ability to interpret various measures of the relationship between exposure/treatment and disease based on absolute and relative risk (risk difference, incidence rate difference, numbers needed to treat vs. risk ratio, incidence rate ratio, odds ratio, hazard ratio).

General Competence:

• Basic knowledge of common challenges in observational studies (selection bias, information bias, and confounding).
• Basic knowledge of and ability to interpret Directed Acyclic Graphs (DAGs).
• Basic understanding of assessing precision in epidemiological studies with an emphasis on the interpretation and use of p-values and confidence intervals.
• Understanding the principles and ability to interpret multivariable analyses.
• Ability to differentiate between and knowledge of the concepts of causation (causality) and statistical association.
• Ability to distinguish between causal interaction and effect modification.
• Familiarity with the principles of instrumental variable analysis, various family designs, and case-only designs.

How to apply for this course: https://www.ntnu.edu/studies/researchcourses

Back