Epidemiological methods: about time.
Epidemiological studies often produce false positive results due to use of statistical approaches that either ignore or distort time. The three time-related issues of focus in this discussion are: (1) cross-sectional vs. cohort studies, (2) statistical significance vs. public health significance, and (3), how risk factors "work together" to impact public health significance. The issue of time should be central to all thinking in epidemiology research, affecting sampling, measurement, design, analysis and, perhaps most important, the interpretation of results that might influence clinical and public-health decision-making and subsequent clinical research.
Kraemer
Helena Chmura
HC
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Stanford University, 1116 Forest Avenue, Palo Alto, CA 94301, USA. hckhome@pacbell.net
D004812:Epidemiologic Methods; D011634:Public Health; D012307:Risk Factors; D013223:Statistics as Topic