Causality Flashcards
Who created the postulates of determining that a disease was caused by a bacteria?
Robert Koch 1890
What are Koch’s postulates?
Consistency
Specificity
Biological coherence
Predictive or experimental performance
Explain consistency re Koch
Agent must be shown to be present in every case of the disease by isolation in pure culture
What is Koch’s specificity?
Agent must not be found in the case of another disease
What is Koch’s biological coherence?
Once isolated, the agent must be capable of reproducing the disease in experimental animals
What is Koch’s predictive performance?
The agent must be recovered from the experimental disease produced
What criteria of causality can be used?
Koch
Bradford Hill
Susser
Rothman’s Sufficient
Web of causation
What is Bradford Hill’s criteria of causality?
Temporal association
Dose-response association
Specificity
Consistency
Plausible biological association
High strength of oassociation
Absence of reverse causality
Susser’s categories of causation
Strength
Specificity - in cause and effect
Consistency
Predictive Performance
Coherence/plausability
How can one measure Susser’s consistency?
Replicability
Subcategories of Susser’s Coherence category?
Theoretical
Factual
Biological
Statistical
Essential categories of Susser’s causality
Association
Direction of prediction
Time order
How is Susser’s association category judged?
By strength of probabilities based on preset expectations of chance occurrences and consistency upon replication.
Explain Susser’s category of Direction of Prediction
Change in one state assumed to be the effect must be consequent on change in independent antecedent states presumed to be the cause.
Which essential criteria of Sussers is more critical in defining causality?
Direction of Prediction
Explain Susser’s time order category
Reversal of time order assures elimination of putative cause
What is sufficient cause?
Minimal set of conditions that produce an outcome rather than just one
In which studies does one see sufficient cause
Epidemiology
What makes up sufficient cause?
Component cause
Importance of component cause
Outcome will not occur by a causal pathway if any of the components are missing