EPIDEMIOLOGY AND APPLIED MEDICAL RESEARCH

MANDATORY ATTENDANCES – LECTURES: No

Learning process support through the e-class online platform

Use of ICT (e-mail) in communication with students

Evaluation methods.

Multiple choice questions (60% of the total mark) and submission, written work with public presentation (40% of the total mark).

The evaluation of the course and the teachers is carried out - at the end of the semester - through the completion by the students of a special questionnaire. Students are encouraged to express their opinions through the questionnaire both on the educational process of the course in question, and on any changes that are necessary in their opinion. Student responses are taken into account in order to make improvements.

Upon successful completion of the course, the student will be able to:

• Understand the importance of epidemiology as a research method for disease prevention and treatment. Furthermore, he will be able to understand the importance of the collective and comparative perspective, which also constitutes the superiority of epidemiological over case-based clinical research.
• Has knowledge of the uses of epidemiology, the main epidemiological indicators (prevalence, point prevalence and time period prevalence, incidence, cumulative incidence and incidence rate, mortality, mortality, incidence rate), the main sources of epidemiological data, the main categories of epidemiological studies (descriptive: cross-sectional studies, ecological and analytical: patient controls, retrospective series, prospective series, clinical trial) and outcome measure indicators (odds ratio, relative risk, attributable risk) of sampling methods, basic knowledge of medical statistics and collection principles, registration, analysis and presentation of epidemiological data. He will also have knowledge of the basic operating principles of an epidemiological surveillance system for infectious diseases as well as the basic principles of investigating and dealing with an epidemic. Additionally, the student will have knowledge of the concept of causality as well as the concept of systematic error and confounding factor. Finally, he will have knowledge of the basic principles of a critical approach to a published article as well as systematic review & post-analysis.
• Is able to distinguish with fluency the main categories of epidemiological research and to classify a given research into one of the above categories.
• Uses acquired knowledge in order to: a. to plan and carry out an epidemiological investigation, b. to use the main epidemiological indicators, c. Present its results and use simple statistical analysis techniques. d. Investigate an epidemic, e. Critically approach a published paper and make a global assessment of its results and its overall quality, g. Search medical literature through online databases.
• Critically analyzes a published work with emphasis on its design, sampling method, definition of exposure and outcome, statistical analysis of data, presentation of results, control of confounding factors and presence of systematic errors, and evaluation of conclusions of the balanced formulation of the research findings.
• He can collaborate with his fellow students to search the medical literature and to critically evaluate published research papers. He can also collaborate with his colleagues - in the context of laboratory exercises - in the application of epidemiological indicators and in the scenario of investigating and dealing with an epidemic

General Skills

• Search, analysis and synthesis of data and information, using the necessary technologies
• Adaptation to new situations
• Decision making
• Autonomous work
• Teamwork
• Exercise criticism and self-criticism
• Promotion of free, creative and inductive thinking

2. EXERCISES
"Introduction to Epidemiology Exercises/Exercises to search for the causes of diseases"
"Rates and ratio calculation exercises"
"Exercise for calculating demographic indicators - Demography"
"Design and organization of a cross-sectional epidemiological study - design and presentation of a questionnaire"
"Exercises in Sampling and Estimating a Population Sample"
"Epidemiological data organization exercise. Ways of presenting results»
"Smoking and lung cancer. Study of sufferers and controls and retrospective series"
"Epidemiological Program epi-info 2000-Exercise OSWEGO"
"Efficacy and Safety Review of Ephedra"
“Hepatitis A, alcohol and oyster consumption
"Epidemiological surveillance exercise. Investigation and treatment of an outbreak of gastroenteritis at a wedding reception".
"Article review in English and Greek, Study ranking exercises"

General and clinical epidemiology. D. Trichopoulos

Epidemiology, A. Aschengrau