Epi Practice Midterm

T or F  

Health can be accurately measured as a yes or no variable.

F

T or F   

If not for ethics one could apply experimental design to any epidemiological question.

F

T or F   

The OR is only appropriate for case-control studies.

F

T or F   

Some infectious diseases are chronic.

T

T or F   

If a study has no internal validity it can never have external validity.

T

T or F  

Studies that are only descriptive serve no real purpose in public health.

F

T or F  

A test with 100% sensitivity is always a perfect test.

F

T or F  

If a study has any error at all it will have no validity

F

In a histogram the bars touch because

It looks better

It is group data

There’s no value between the bars

The intervals are equal in width

There’s no value between the bars

A hypothesis in epidemiology must be __________ and  ______________

measurable, testable

In a pie chart the size of the wedges indicates the proportion

of the entire population

of a specified population

of deaths

of disease

how hungry I am

of a specified population

Person, place and time variables are important because they are related to

Disease distributions

Advertising revenues

Biostatistics

Informatics

Disease distributions

Which of the following is not considered a “person” variable?

Age    

address    

gender     

education

address    

Since cause is difficult to prove epidemiologists prefer the word _______________

association

When data is collected and summarized but not used for tests or statistical comparisons it is _______________

descriptive

When data is summarized in such a way as to adjust differing age distributions to all the same age distributions it is _________________

standardized

T or F

Demographics are the risk factors

F

In what century were many of the statistical tests currently used first introduced?

20th (1900s)

T or F

John Snow stopped the cholera epidemic.

F

John Graunt’s analysis of the Bills of Mortality is an early example of the use of what kind of data?

Estimates

Predictions

Empirical

Theoretical

Empirical

_______________ is the branch of mathematics used in epidemiology

Biostatistics

T or F: Epidemiology does not benefit individuals, it only benefits groups.

F

Medical practices are sometimes based on _______________ instead of _________________.

eminence, evidence

Epidemiologists study health in… (best answer)

biostatistics

human populations

any population

epidemics

Human populations

When an epidemic is global it is referred to as a _________________.

pandemic

Epidemiology is the study of health on a ________________ level.

population

Sometimes apparent associations in epidemiology are only _______________ and not true associations

artifactual

T or F

Epidemiology is difficult because it is hard to study animals.

F

T or F

Animal studies may motivate epidemiological studies but are not epidemiological themselves

T

T or F

Chronic diseases are never communicable.

F

Validity refers to how close a study comes to the ________________

truth

T or F

Even if there is no change in the death rate due to a specific disease the proportionate mortality may change due to changes in the death rates of other diseases.

T

A test that is reliable will be repeatedly produce

The same results

Significant results

Valid results

All of the above

The same results

T or F

Confounding and effect modification are both threats to the validity of a study that a researcher cannot do anything about.

F

If 10% of a population got a cold every month but when they are given a new herbal remedy only 2% do it would be correct (given the usual conventions) to say:

The RR=5

The OR=0.2

The RR=0.2

The herbal remedy stock will be a good investment

The RR=0.2

Since age is often a risk for health outcome and may be associated with exposures it may act as a ________________ in epidemiological studies.

confounder

T or F

It is often easier to measure disease than it is to measure health.

T

Chronic disease with low incidence but extremely long duration will have higher _______________________ than if the disease had a short duration.

prevalence

T or F

All disease can be neatly categorized as chronic or communicable.

F

An investigation that begins with a group that is diseased and finds a group without the disease to compare them to in terms of past exposures is a

Case series

Ecological study

Case-control

Cross-sectional

Cohort

RCT

Case-control

A study comparing the rate of heart disease in different counties to crime rates in those same counties is

Case series

Ecological study

Case-control

Cross-sectional

Cohort

RCT

Ecological study

A study that randomly assigns participants to receive treatment or a placebo is a

Case series

Ecological study

Case-control

Cross-sectional

Cohort

RCT

RCT

If a measurement can be repeated and produce the same results each time (and nothing has changed) we would say it was

not confounded

valid

reliable

plausible

reliable

In epidemiology rates include some measure of

age

time

risk factors

velocity

time

If comparison groups start out identical other than the risk factor then

there can be no effect modification

there will be no bias

the study will be more fair

there can be no confounding

there can be no confounding

To study a risk factor one must compare groups that

Share the risk factor

Have different levels of the risk factor

Have different outcomes from the risk factor

Cover a broad age range

Have different levels of the risk factor

The proportion of a sample with a disease at any one point in time is called the _______________________ of that disease.

prevalence

If the relative risk of a rare disease given a certain exposure is 10 the odds ratio of having the disease given that same exposure will be approximately ___.

10

An individual’s age at an event and knowledge of the time period of the event will define the birth _____________ the individual belongs to.

cohort

In a cohort study the _________is preferred to the ____________as an appropriate measure of association because it is more easily interpretable.

RR, OR

The only measure of association we used that can be calculated directly from a case control study is the _________________.

OR

A measurement tool we consider the most accurate and true at all times, and we compare all other measures, is known as a _________________ in epidemiology.

gold standard

In epidemiology both a group of people with similar characteristics (especially age) and a study group that begins the study free from the outcome being studied are known as a _________.

cohort

A concern for the well-being of study participants comes under the ethical principle of ________________.

beneficence

All study designs, with the exception of trials are considered ________ studies.

observational

A survey of 10,000 people finds 5 people reporting they have cancer X.

What is the prevalence per 100,000?

50 per 100,000

A treatment has recently been developed for this cancer that, while not curing it, does render it non-fatal.

What will be the eventual effect on the prevalence?

increases