title: [The epidemiologist facing assessment of low risk].
abstract: Epidemiological studies on low risks involve a number of major methodological difficulties. This review defines the concept of low risk and emphasises the need to control all large, possibly disease-related risk factors, before low risk factors can be evaluated. This procedure is also essential in identifying confounding factors. There is a special need to evaluate statistical power in studies on low risk factors, and the representativeness of both cases and controls should be carefully verified, particularly in case-control studies. The need to control the researcher's wish bias and the main requirements for meta-analysis are also presented.
authors.affiliation: Institut de Médecine Sociale et Préventive CMU, Genève, Suisse.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Rylander
mesh_terms: D016022:Case-Control Studies; D015984:Causality; D015986:Confounding Factors, Epidemiologic; D004812:Epidemiologic Methods; D006801:Humans; D015201:Meta-Analysis as Topic; D012307:Risk Factors; D015983:Selection Bias
vernacular_title: L'épidémiologiste face à l'estimation des faibles risques.