Related Research Articles
Epidemiology is the study and analysis of the distribution, patterns and determinants of health and disease conditions in a defined population.
Mortality rate, or death rate, is a measure of the number of deaths in a particular population, scaled to the size of that population, per unit of time. Mortality rate is typically expressed in units of deaths per 1,000 individuals per year; thus, a mortality rate of 9.5 in a population of 1,000 would mean 9.5 deaths per year in that entire population, or 0.95% out of the total. It is distinct from "morbidity", which is either the prevalence or incidence of a disease, and also from the incidence rate.
Legionella is a genus of pathogenic gram-negative bacteria that includes the species L. pneumophila, causing legionellosis including a pneumonia-type illness called Legionnaires' disease and a mild flu-like illness called Pontiac fever.
Clinical trials are prospective biomedical or behavioral research studies on human participants designed to answer specific questions about biomedical or behavioral interventions, including new treatments and known interventions that warrant further study and comparison. Clinical trials generate data on dosage, safety and efficacy. They are conducted only after they have received health authority/ethics committee approval in the country where approval of the therapy is sought. These authorities are responsible for vetting the risk/benefit ratio of the trial—their approval does not mean the therapy is 'safe' or effective, only that the trial may be conducted.
Anecdotal evidence is evidence based only on personal observation, collected in a casual or non-systematic manner.
A case–control study is a type of observational study in which two existing groups differing in outcome are identified and compared on the basis of some supposed causal attribute. Case–control studies are often used to identify factors that may contribute to a medical condition by comparing subjects who have that condition/disease with patients who do not have the condition/disease but are otherwise similar. They require fewer resources but provide less evidence for causal inference than a randomized controlled trial. A case–control study is often used to produce an odds ratio, which is an inferior measure of strength of association compared to relative risk, but new statistical methods make it possible to use a case-control study to estimate relative risk, risk differences, and other quantities.
A cancer cluster is a disease cluster in which a high number of cancer cases occurs in a group of people in a particular geographic area over a limited period of time.
Infection prevention & control is the discipline concerned with preventing healthcare-associated infections; a practical rather than academic sub-discipline of epidemiology. In Northern Europe, infection prevention and control is expanded from healthcare into a component in public health, known as "infection protection". It is an essential part of the infrastructure of health care. Infection control and hospital epidemiology are akin to public health practice, practiced within the confines of a particular health-care delivery system rather than directed at society as a whole.
Equid alphaherpesvirus 1, formerly Equine herpesvirus 1 (EHV-1), is a virus of the family Herpesviridae that causes abortion, respiratory disease and occasionally neonatal mortality in horses. Initial spread of EHV-1 by a newly introduced horse through direct and indirect contact can lead to abortion and perinatal infection in up to 70 percent of a previously unexposed herd. Abortion usually occurs in the last four months of gestation, two to four weeks after infection of the mare. Perinatal infection can lead to pneumonia and death. Encephalitis can occur in affected animals, leading to ataxia, paralysis, and death. There is a vaccine available, however its efficacy is questionable. The virus varies in severity from sub-clinical to very severe. Most horses have been infected with EHV-1, but the virus can become latent and persist without ever causing signs of infection. In 2006, an outbreak of EHV-1 among stables in Florida resulted in the institution of quarantine measures. The outbreak was determined to have originated in horses imported from Europe via New York, before being shipped to Florida.
Nanotoxicology is the study of the toxicity of nanomaterials. Because of quantum size effects and large surface area to volume ratio, nanomaterials have unique properties compared with their larger counterparts that affect their toxicity. Of the possible hazards, inhalation exposure appears to present the most concern, with animal studies showing pulmonary effects such as inflammation, fibrosis, and carcinogenicity for some nanomaterials. Skin contact and ingestion exposure are also a concern.
In epidemiology, a clinical case definition, a clinical definition, or simply a case definition lists the clinical criteria by which public health professionals determine whether a person's illness is included as a case in an outbreak investigation—that is, whether a person is considered directly affected by an outbreak. Absent an outbreak, case definitions are used in the surveillance of public health in order to categorize those conditions present in a population.
The 1983 West Bank fainting epidemic occurred in late March and early April 1983. Researchers point to mass hysteria as the most likely explanation. Large numbers of Palestinians complained of fainting and dizziness, the vast majority of whom were teenage girls with a smaller number of female Israeli soldiers in multiple West Bank towns, leading to 943 hospitalizations.
A superspreading event (SSEV) is an event in which an infectious disease is spread much more than usual, while an unusually contagious organism infected with a disease is known as a superspreader. In the context of a human-borne illness, a superspreader is an individual who is more likely to infect others, compared with a typical infected person. Such superspreaders are of particular concern in epidemiology.
Impacted wisdom teeth is a condition where the third molars are prevented from erupting into the mouth. This can be caused by a physical barrier, such as other teeth, or when the tooth is angled away from a vertical position. Completely unerupted wisdom teeth usually result in no symptoms, although they can sometimes develop cysts or neoplasms. Partially erupted wisdom teeth can develop cavities or pericoronitis. Removal of impacted wisdom teeth is advised in the case of certain pathologies, such as nonrestorable caries or cysts.
The discipline of forensic epidemiology (FE) is a hybrid of principles and practices common to both forensic medicine and epidemiology. FE is directed at filling the gap between clinical judgment and epidemiologic data for determinations of causality in civil lawsuits and criminal prosecution and defense.
The Integrated Disease Surveillance Programme (IDSP) is a nationwide disease surveillance system in India incorporating both the state and central governments aimed at early detection and long term monitoring of diseases for enabling efficient policy decisions. It was started in 2004 with the assistance of the World Bank. A central surveillance unit has been set up at the National Centre for Disease Control in Delhi. All states, union territories, and district headquarters of India have established surveillance units. Weekly data is submitted from over 90% of the 741 districts in the country. With the aim of improving digital surveillance capabilities, the Integrated Health Information Platform (IHIP) was launched in a number of states in November 2019.
Investigation of diving accidents includes investigations into the causes of reportable incidents in professional diving and recreational diving accidents, usually when there is a fatality or litigation for gross negligence.
In early months of 2019, a measles outbreak occurred in the Portland metropolitan area, including the Clark County, Washington suburbs, in the United States. At the time, the outbreak was the largest outbreak in more than two decades; outbreaks in 2019 in areas including Brooklyn and Rockland County, New York have since seen far greater numbers of cases.
Rodney Thornton Jackson is a New Zealand medically-trained epidemiologist who has had lead roles in publicly-funded research focussing on systems to effectively identify risk factors in the epidemiology of chronic diseases, in particular cardiovascular diseases (CVDs). This involved linking large cohort studies to regional and national electronic health databases and enabling the generation of new risk-prevention equations using web-based tools, such as the PREDICT model, to implement, monitor and improve risk assessment and management guidelines. Research on asthma in which Jackson participated influenced decisions made by the New Zealand Ministry of Health, and he has contributed to public debate on dietary risk factors for heart attacks and strokes. Following an evidence-based approach to identification of disparities in medical outcomes for different groups within the New Zealand population, Jackson took a position on racism in the medical sector. In 2020, he became a frequent commentator in the media on the approach of the New Zealand government to the COVID-19 pandemic. Since 1999, Jackson has been professor of epidemiology at the University of Auckland.
SaTScan is a software tool that employs scan statistics for the spatial and temporal analysis of clusters of events. The software is trademarked by Martin Kulldorff, and was designed originally for public health and epidemiology to identify clusters of cases in both space and time and to perform statistical analysis to determine if these clusters are significantly different from what would be expected by chance The software provides a user-friendly interface and a range of statistical methods, making it accessible to researchers and practitioners. While not a full Geographic Information System, the outputs from SaTScan can be integrated with software such as ArcGIS or QGIS to visualize and analyze spatial data, and to map the distribution of various phenomena.
References
- 1 2 3 4 Miquel Porta, ed. (2008). A Dictionary of Epidemiology. Oxford University Press, USA. pp. 42–43. ISBN 978-0-19-971815-3.
Aggregations of relatively uncommon events or diseases in space and/or time in amounts that are believed or perceived to be greater than could be expected by chance. Putative disease clusters are often perceived to exist on the basis of anecdotal evidence, and much effort may be expended by epidemiologists and biostatisticians in assessing whether a true cluster of disease exists.
- ↑ "Guidelines for Investigating Clusters of Health Events". cdc.gov. Archived from the original on 21 March 2021. Retrieved 21 March 2021.
