Epidemiology Exam 1 Flashcards
Epidemiology is a public health basic science which studies the _____ and _____ of health-related ____ or ____ in specific populations to control disease and illness and promote health.
Distribution.
Determinants.
states.
events.
Distribution of disease involves figuring out the _____ and _____ of disease occurrences?
Frequencies.
Patterns.
This type of epidemiology, _____ epidemiology, studies the ____ of disease by analyzing these three factors: ____, ____, and ____.
Descriptive. Distribution. Who. Where. When.
This type of epidemiology, _____ epidemiology, studies the determinants of disease by analyzing ____ vs. ____, aka the ____ and ____.
Analytic. associations. causes. why. how.
The 6 core functions of epidemiology, which help to promote health in ____.
- public health surveillance
- field investigation
- analytic studies
- evaluation
- linkages
- policy development
Populations.
This core function portrays ongoing patterns of disease occurrence, so investigations, control and prevention measures can be developed and applied. The ____ registry can be used for data management and interpretation.
Public health surveillance.
NNDSS.
This core function of epidemiology helps to determine sources/vehicles of disease; to learn more about the history, clinical spectrum, descriptive epidemiology, and risk factors. The CDC has a department, the ____, dedicated to this.
Field Investigation.
Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS).
This core function of epi helps to advance the information (hypotheses) generated by descriptive epi techniques. Some characteristics include:
Analysis or Analytic Studies.
Characteristics: study design, use of a comparison group, data interpretation, communication of study data/findings.
This core function systematically and objectively determines relevance, effectiveness, efficiency and impact of activities.
Evaluation.
This core function collaborates, communicates, links to other public health and healthcare professionals and the public themselves.
Linkages.
This core function provides input, testimony, recommendations regarding disease control and prevention strategies, reportable disease regulations, and health-care policy.
Policy development.
Epidemiologists are experts at describing and comparing groups by ____, ____, and ____.
Counting (frequencies).
Dividing (percentages).
Comparing.
He was one of the first epidemiologists and he found this contaminated, communal water source as a common point source of disease.
John Snow.
Broad Street pump.
List the three types of surveillance systems.
- Passive
- Active
- Syndromic
Define passive surveillance system.
Relies on healthcare system to follow regulations to report on new diagnoses. Health system passively waits for reports to come in so they can track disease frequency/occurrences over time and within populations.
Define active surveillance system.
public health official go into communities to search for new disease/condition cases.
Define syndromic surveillance system. This type of surveillance, ____, is also considered syndromic.
a system that looks for pre-defined signs/symptoms of patients related to trackable-but-rare diseases/conditions.
Biosurveillance
The time between exposure and onset of disease can be referred to as _____, or _____, period.
Induction/Incubation period.
The time between onset of disease and disease detection (symptoms or diagnosis) can be referred to ____ period.
Latency. Sometimes patients are diagnosed presymptomatic.
The four stages of the natural history of disease timeline are:
- Stage of susceptibility
- Stage of subclinical disease.
- Stage of clinical disease.
- Stage of recovery, disability, or death.
This demarcates the stage between susceptibility and subclinical disease.
Exposure.
This demarcates the stage between subclinical disease and clinical disease.
Onset of symptoms. It becomes “clinical” when the symptoms are recognized.
____ ____ occur during the stage of subclinical disease.
Pathologic changes.
The usual time of diagnosis occurs during this stage.
Stage of clinical disease.
The most critical element that must be defined/delineated BEFORE any of the “who” of descriptive epi can be acquired?
CASE definition: What requirements must be met for the person to be diagnosed.
Define Case definition.
A set of uniform criteria used to define a disease/condition for public health surveillance
Case definitions are updated every year using the recommendations made by the ____. They recommend that state health departments report cases of selected diseases to ____.
Council of State and Territorial epidemiologists (CSTE).
CDC’s National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System (NNDSS).
___ vs. ____ case definitions must be distinguished in order to accurately define how we detect and diagnose cases.
confirmed vs. probable.
List and define the five categories used to describe the geographic extent of disease frequencies.
- Epidemic: disease occurrence clearly in excess of normal. community/period are clearly defined.
- Outbreak (or “cluster”): epidemic limited to a localized increase in the occurrence of disease.
If “outbreak” is used first, on campus for example, then “epidemic” could be used if it spread to a larger area, KC metro, for example.
- Endemic: normal, constant presence of disease for that specific area, but higher than surrounding areas.
- Emergency of International Concern: Step before pandemic. alerts the world to the need for high vigilance.
- Pandemic: An epidemic spread world-wide. (2009 H1N1 pandemic).
Epi Curves visually depict both ____ & ____ of disease occurrence and ____ of disease occurrence.
Magnitude & timing.
Pattern (shape)
The pattern (shape) of disease occurrence in an epi curve shows either a ___ source or a ____ source. Define both.
Common / Point: not spread person-to-person, spread from a single point source.
Propagated: person-to-person.
The magnitude and timing of disease occurrence can help to identify what?
sentinel/index cases, peaks, outliers, duration of outbreak.
Epi curves can help to form hypotheses about:
routes of transmission, probable exposure period, incubation period (could help identify/eliminate causes)
List the three types of common/point source epi curves
- Continuous with no sentinel case.
- Continuous with sentinel case.
- Intermittent
What’s the major difference between a propagated graph with an index case and a common/point source graph with an index case?
The propagated with index case graph has a sawtooth pattern, with the gap representing the average incubation period.
What are the three numerical representations of measures of disease frequency? Define each.
- Proportions: simple percentage, division of 2 related numbers (part/whole).
- Ratios: division of 2 unrelated numbers.
- Rates: proportion (%) with time incorporated into the denominator.
3 key factors comparing measures of disease frequency between groups?
- # affected/impacted (frequency/count)
- Size of the source population, or those at risk.
- length of time population is followed.
Define incidence vs. prevalence.
Both terms are ____.
Incidence: new cases of disease.
Prevalence: existing cases + new cases.
Proportions.
