Section: Module 7: Lesson 2: Biostatistics in Public Health Programs | Biostatistics | NextGenU.org
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Learning Objectives

- Understand that public health programs rely on biostatistics principles and methodologies to collect, analyze use, and present data.
- Relate specific public health contributions to biostatistics concepts learned in this course.
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- Read the entire web page.
- Understand that public health programs rely on biostatistics principles and methodologies to collect, analyze, use, and present data
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- Scroll down, and under the tab titled "Choose a video:", highlight the link titled "Cancer Statistics". Watch the entire video.
- Understand that public health programs rely on biostatistics principles and methodologies to collect, analyze, use, and present data
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- Read page 17 of the article.
- Understand that public health programs rely on biostatistics principles and methodologies to collect, analyze, use, and present data
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- Find a research article that uses quantitative methodology and answer as many of the following questions as you can in 500 to 1000 words. Most journals and databases have open access content.
- Guidelines for selecting an appropriate article:
- Choose an article from a peer reviewed journal with impact factor of 2.0 or more.
- Choose an article published within the past 5 years.
- Choose an article relevant to the current research and health conditions in a country that is of interest to you.
- An example of an appropriate paper is here. However, you may find that some articles use statistical techniques that you haven’t learned in this course—this is ok. Do your best to understand and describe what the authors have done, and look up any references to methods if needed. The goal of this activity is to (i) help you review the concepts learned and (ii) challenge yourself to learn new methods as they become relevant in your practice. For practising public health professionals, biostatistics is a life-long learning process.
- As you review the paper, focus on the following methods-related questions below:
- What is/are the main relationship being studied? What is the research question? Is there any hypothesis testing involved?
- What are the predictors and outcomes? What type of variables are they?
- How were data obtained for the study? What are the advantages and disadvantages from a statistical perspective?
- Summarize any descriptive techniques in the paper. What summary statistics do the authors use? What data visualization techniques do they use? Are they effective in helping you understand the study?
- What analytic techniques do the authors use? Summarize the main statistical technique used and discuss why the authors chose to use this method. Describe its strengths and limitations in principle and in context, as well as the assumptions and specific parameters used (e.g. significance level, adjustments, etc.).
- Based on your understanding of the research and the results presented, do you agree with the authors’ interpretations? Are there issues present that could bias the authors’ interpretations?
- Relate specific public health contributions to biostatistics concepts learned in this course
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To access the quiz, click on the name of the quiz provided above. On the following screen, click the "Preview quiz now" button to view the case studies and respond to the questions.
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- Explore the links under "Behavioral Health Resources" to become familiar with prevention programs and practices that have been developed based on evidence obtained from research and statistical data:
- Explore the links under "Behavioral Health Resources" to become familiar with prevention programs and practices that have been developed based on evidence obtained from research and statistical data:
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- Read pages 18 to 21 of the article.