Epidemic Curves

Question 1

What is an epi curve?

Answer 1

A graph displaying the total number of cases over a period of time

Question 2

What are the 3 main types of epi curves?

Answer 2

Common Source, Point Source, and Propagated

Question 3

If the graph shows multiple waves, what kind of epi curve is it?

Answer 3

Propagated

Question 4

If a graph doesn’t show any spike in numbers, what kind of epi curve is it?

Answer 4

Common Source

Question 5

If the number of cases jumped from 13 to 105 in one day, what kind of epi curve would you expect?

Answer 5

Point source

Question 6

If an outlier isn’t an error, what could be causing this point of data?

Answer 6

Different outbreak source, A case exposed earlier than the other, An unrelated case, A case exposed later than the others, or Case with a long incubation period

Question 7

What is an incubation period?

Answer 7

An incubation period is the time between a person contracting a virus and their symptoms starting to show.

Question 8

How do you calculate the average incubation period?

Answer 8

Count backward from the peak of the epi curve

Question 9

How do you calculate the minimum incubation period?

Answer 9

Count backward from earliest case