Section outline

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  • Wednesday, January 10, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Lecture: Introduction, Scientific Process, Study Design (COH & RCT)

    Introduction to the course, discussion of the “life of research study” and tips for writing articles and proposals, strengths and limitations of randomized clinical trials, similarities and differences between components of randomized clinical trials and observational studies, and conditions under which observational cohorts can emulate a “target trial” and support causal inference. 

    Faculty:  June Chan

    Location:      Mission Hall 1406

    • Prospectus:

    • Introduction to EPI 2017, Winter 2018 File
      Uploaded 01/8/18, 12:24
    • INTRO Epid 207 Winter 2018 PPT Slides File
      Uploaded 01/9/18, 22:09

    • Session Slides:

    • Lec Slides Jan 10, 2018 Intro Sci Process and Study Design File

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Watch URL
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:

      Rothman, Greenland and Lash 2008 (RGL), Modern Epidemiology, Ch. 6 (focus on RCT and COH) & skim Chapter 7. Please note, RGL Chapter 7 will also be assigned for a future lecture on Person Time/Bias in Cohorts.

    • Lawson KA. Multivitamin Use and Risk of Prostate cancer in the National Institutes of Health-AARP Diet and Health Study. JNCI 99:754-764, 2007 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Assignment:

    • HW 1 Intro Study Design Coh DUE 180117 File

    • Assignment Due Date: January 17, 2018 at the beginning of Small Group Section

    • Week #1 Homework Submission Assignment

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

    • HW 1 Intro to Study Design and Cohort Answer Key File
    • JMChan Bubble Comments on Lawson et al JNCI 2007 HW1 article File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only
    • Summary of comments on Lawson et al jNCI 07 HW1 File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only
    • AARP diet questionnaire baseline - supplemental FYI only File

  • Wednesday, January 17, 2018

    Lecture: Causal Inference (Pre-recorded; view on own)

    Historical perspectives on causal inference in science generally; different models/heuristics for causal inference in epidemiology specifically.

    Faculty:  June Chan

    • Session slides:

    • Causal Inference Part 1 Intro and Theories EPI207 2018 FINAL File
    • Causal Inference Part 2 BHill EPI207 2018 FINAL File
    • Causal Inference Part 3 Rothman EPI207 2018 FINAL File
    • Causal Inference Part 4 Counterfactual EPI207 2018 FINAL File
    • Positivity & Consistency Revisited_slides_Post Small Group 1_17_18 File

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Causal Inference Part 1 Intro and Theories Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only
    • Causal Inference Part 2 BHill Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only
    • Causal Inference Part 3 Rothman Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only
    • Causal Inference Part 4 Counterfactual Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:

      Ch. 2 Rothman/Greenland/Lash

    • Article to read for HW2 Jain et al JAMA 2015 File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

    • Optional Reading:

      Chapter 1, Hernán & Robins.

    • Fedak KM. Applying the Bradford Hill criteria in the 21st century: how data integration has changed causal inference in molecular epidemiology. Emerg Themes Epidemiol. 12:14:1-9, 2015 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02
    • VanderWeele TJ. Invited Commentary: The Continuing Need for Suggicient cause Model Today. AJE 185:11:1041-1043,2017 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Assignment:

    • HW2 Causal Inference Questions DUE Jan 24, 2018 File

    • Assignment Due Date: January 24, 2018 at the beginning of Small Group Section

    • Week #2 Homework Submission Assignment

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

    • HW2 Causal Inf KEY File
    • Jain et al MMR and ASD with annotated comments File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

  • Wednesday, January 17, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Small Group Discussion Section: Cohort 
    Review of prior lecture and problem set 

    Faculty:  June Chan, Chloe Eng, Alon Vaisman

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406 and 1402

  • Wednesday, January 24, 2018

    Lecture: Person-time and Bias in Cohorts (Pre-recorded; view on own)

    Fixed vs. open cohorts; the dynamic allocation of person-time in longitudinal cohorts; patient or survivor cohorts; particular bias issues discussed in the setting of patient cohorts (including selection bias, immortal-person time bias, measurement error bias, confounding by indication, and residual confounding); and how emulation of a target trial may help avoid some of these biases.

    Faculty: June Chan

    • Session Slides:

    • Coh PT Bias Part 1 OpenFix Calc EPI207_2018_slides File
    • Coh PT Bias Part 2 PT EPI207_2018_slides File
    • Coh PT Bias Part 3 SurvCoh Conf EPI207_2018_slides File
    • Coh PT Bias Part 4 Sel Bias ImmPT EPI207_2018_slides File

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Person-time and Bias in Cohorts Part 1 Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only
    • Person-time and Bias in Cohorts Part 2 Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only
    • Person-time and Bias in Cohorts Part 3 Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only
    • Person-time and Bias in Cohorts Part 4 Media Resource
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:

      Chapter 7, Rothman, Greenland, & Lash 3rd Edition

      Choe, K.S., et al, Aspirin use and the risk of prostate cancer mortality in men treated with prostatectomy or radiotherapy. 2012, Journal of Clinical Oncology, 30(28), pp.3540-3544.

      https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22927523

    • Optional Reading:

      Emilsson L, García-Albéniz X, Logan RW, Caniglia EC, Kalager M, Hernán MA. Examining Bias in Studies of Statin Treatment and Survival in Patients With Cancer. JAMA Oncol. 2018, PubMed PMID: 28822996. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28822996 

      Hernán MA et al, Specifying a target trial prevents immortal time bias and other self-inflicted injuries in observational analyses J Clin Epid, 2016. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27237061

    • Assignment:

    • HW3 Questions on Person Time and Bias DUE Jan31, 2018 File

    • Assignment Due Date: January 31, 2018 at the beginning of Small Group Section

    • Week #3 Homework Submission Assignment

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

    • HW 3 Person Time & Bias KEY File
    • Choe et al JCO 2012 Wk 3 article with JMC comments File
    • Choe et al JCO 2012 Wk3 article with JMC comment summary File

  • Wednesday, January 24, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Small Group Discussion Section: Causal Inference
    Review of prior lecture and problem set 

    Faculty:  June Chan, Chloe Eng, Alon Vaisman

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406 and 1405

  • Wednesday, January 31, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Live Lecture: DAGS

    We will review how to draw and use Directed Acyclic Graphs.  This will cover applying the d-separation rule, identifying sufficient and minimally sufficient sets, and DAGs to represent common biases in epidemiology.  We will consider representations of alternative study designs and how these representations help identify potential design problems.  Finally, we will discuss limitations of DAGs and controversies about the usefulness of DAGs.

    Faculty:  Maria Glymour

    Location:      Mission Hall 1406

    Just a reminder to please RSVP for next week's 02/07/2018 session: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/epi-tools-workshop-hailey-banack-tickets-41222983052  so we can have a headcount and send out materials!

    • Session Slides:

    • epi207 mmg DAGsJan30 v7 File
    • DAG slides final version post-class Jan 31 File

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Watch URL
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:

      Modern Epidemiology 3rd edition. Chapter 12. Causal Diagrams.

      Thorpe Jr, R.J., Szanton, S.L., Bell, C.N. and Whitfield, K.E., 2016. Education, income and disability in African Americans. Ethnicity & disease, 23(1), pp.12-17.

    • Optional Reading:

      "Using Causal Diagrams to Understand Common Problems in Social Epidemiology", M Glymour.  chapter 18 in Methods in Social Epidemiology, 2nd edn. (2017) Oakes and Kaufman eds. Wiley  (This is an updated and somewhat friendlier version of the chapter in Modern Epi).

      Glymour MM, Weuve J, Berkman LF, Kawachi I, Robins JM. When is baseline adjustment useful in analyses of change? An example with education and cognitive change. American journal of epidemiology. 2005 Aug 1;162(3):267-78. (This is an illustration of a particular problem that could helpfully be represented with DAGs)

      Hernán MA, Hernández-Díaz S, Robins JM. A structural approach to selection bias. Epidemiology. 2004 Sep 1;15(5):615-25. (This was a very influential paper that reconceptualized how we think about selection bias).

      VanderWeele TJ, Hernán MA. Results on differential and dependent measurement error of the exposure and the outcome using signed directed acyclic graphs. American journal of epidemiology. 2012 May 8;175(12):1303-10.



    • Assignment: HW4 has now been posted.  It is due before class on 2/14/18 (INSTEAD OF THE ORIGINAL DUE DATE OF 2/7/14)

    • HW4 DAGs Problem Set DUE Feb 14, 2018 File
    • data file for DAG hw: American Community Survey

    • Assignment Due Date: February 14, 2018 at the beginning of Small Group Section

    • Week #4 Homework Submission Assignment

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

    • HW4 DAGs KEY File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

  • Wednesday, February 7, 2018; 1:15 PM - 4:00 PM

    Live Lecture (as part of Epid Tools Workshop): Quantitative Bias Analysis (QBA) 

    Unfortunately, in real life studies are rarely perfect.  In the past, we relied heavily on limitations sections to discuss qualitatively the potential problems.  As computational power has expanded, the feasibility and importance of formal quantitative bias analysis (QBA) has grown.  In this workshop, Dr. Banack will motivate QBA with her own research on body weight and health.  She will illustrate how to move from conceptualization of potential biases to formal evaluation of the plausible range of magnitude of bias, and incorporation of that into presentation of results. 

    Faculty:  Hailey Banack, University of Buffalo

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406


    Please RSVP: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/epi-tools-workshop-hailey-banack-tickets-41222983052  so we can have a headcount and send out materials!


    • Session Slides:

    • Lecture Slides QBA Banack PDFv1 File

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Watch URL
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:


      Orsini N, Bellocco R, Bottai M, Wolk A, Greenland S. A tool for deterministic and probabilistic sensitivity analysis of epidemiologic studies. Stata J.2008;8(1):29-48.
       http://www.stata-journal.com/sjpdf.html?articlenum=st0138

    • Orsini et al Tool for Deterministic and Probabilistic Sensitivity Analyses File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Optional Reading:

      Flanders DW, Eldridge RC, McClellan W. A nearly unavoidable mechanism for collider bias with index-event studies. Epidemiology. 2014;25(5):762-764.

      Hernán MA, Hernández-Díaz S, Robins JM. A structural approach to selection bias. Epidemiology. 2004;15(5):615-625.

      Fox MP, Lash TL, Greenland S. A method to automate probabilistic sensitivity analyses of misclassified binary variables. International journal of epidemiology.2005;34(6):1370-1376.

    • Flanders et al Epidemiology Brief Report File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02
    • Hernan et al Epidemiology 2004 A structural approach to Selection Bias File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02
    • Fox et al File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Assignment: Both HW#4 and HW#5 will be due before class on 2/14/18.

    • HW5 QBA Problem Set Due Feb 14, 2018 File

    • Assignment Due Date: February 14, 2018 at the beginning of Small Group Section

    • Week #5 Homework Submission Assignment

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

  • Thursday, February 8, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Tom Gaither

    Location:  MH-2500

     

  • Friday, February 9, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Chloe Eng

    Location:  MH-2500 and online or +1 877 853 5247 (Meeting ID: 939 415 258)

     

  • Tuesday, February 13, 2018; 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Alon Vaisman

    Location:  MH-2500

     

  • Wednesday, February 14, 2018

    Lecture: Effect Modification (Parts 1 & 2) (Pre-recorded; view on own)

    Faculty: Cindy Leung

    • Session Slides:

    • Slides for Week 6 Effect Mod & Interaction Part 1 File
    • Slides for Week 6 Effect Mod and Interaction part 2 File

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

      Please note, for this week, we are using 2 lectures provided by Dr. Cindy Leung from 2017. Please ignore the first ~5 minutes of Part 1, as these are recapping the prior week's highlights from last year, and are not relevant for this class in 2018. You should start the Part I video around time-point 4:53. We have left in place-holder slides in the slide deck, just in case there are embedded references to slide numbers, so that those would align. 

      Thank you! - JMC

    • Watch : Cindy Leung - Interaction and effect-measure modification (Part 1) URL
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only
    • Watch : Cindy - Interaction and effect measure modification (Part 2) URL
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:

           Ch. 5, Concepts of Interaction, Rothman/Greenland/Lash, Modern Epidemiology, 2008, 3rd edition

    • Turner et al AJE 2014 Week 6 Interaction File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Optional Reading:

    • Knol et al Int J Epid 2007 Interaction on Additive Scale File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Assignment:

    • hw #6 interaction DUE feb 28, 2018 File
    • Interaction Dataset for HW6 File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

    • Assignment Due Date: February 28, 2018 at the beginning of Small Group Section

    • Week #6 Homework Submission Assignment

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

    • HW6 Answer Key Effect Mod File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

  • Wednesday, February 14, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Small Group Discussion Section: DAGS, QBA, Bias
    Review of prior lecture and problem set 

    Faculty:  June Chan, Chloe Eng, Alon Vaisman

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406 and 1407

  • Thursday, February 15, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Tom Gaither

    Location:  MH-2800

     

  • Friday, February 16, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Chloe Eng

    Location:  MH-2500 and online or +1 877 853 5247 (Meeting ID: 939 415 258)

     

  • Tuesday, February 20, 2018; 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Alon Vaisman

    Location:  MH-2500

     

  • Wednesday, February 21, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Lecture: Case-Control Study Design & Matching in Observational Studies

    This lecture will review case-control study design and then go more in-depth into matching, including the purpose of matching, matching in cohort and case-control studies.


    Faculty:  Erin Van Blarigan

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406

    • Session Slides:

    • VanBlarigan CaCo and Matching 2018 Share File

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Watch URL
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:

           Chapter 8 AND pages 171-182 AND 283-288. Rothman/Greenland/Lash, 2008, 3rd edition, Case-Control Studies

            Poynter JN, Gruber SB, Higgins PD, Almog R, Bonner JD, Rennert HS, Low M, Greenson JK, Rennert G. Statins and the risk of colorectal cancer. N Engl J Med. 2005 May, PubMed PMID: 15917383. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/?term=15917383


    • Optional Reading:

    • Agalliu I. Associations of Oral α-, β-, and γ-Human Papillomavirus Types With Risk of Incident Head and Neck Cancer. JAMA Oncol. 2(5):599-606, 2016 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02
    • Wallis CJD. Comparison of postoperative outcomes among patients treated by male and female surgeons: a population based matched cohort study. BMJ. 359:j4366, 2017 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02
    • Lyall K. Parental Social Responsiveness and Risk of Autism Spectrum Disorder in Offspring. JAMA Psychiatry. 71(8):936-942, 2014 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Assignment:

    • Homework 7 Case Control Due March 7 2018 File

    • Assignment Due Date: March 7, 2018 at the beginning of Small Group Section

      REMINDER:  Please remember to register in advance for the Epid Tools workshop on 3/14, Dr. Jarvis Chen:    RSVP: http://bit.ly/2BzGzJy


    • Week #7 Homework Submission Assignment

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

    • Answer Key for Homework 7 File

  • Thursday, February 22, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Tom Gaither

    Location:  MH-2500

     

  • Friday, February 23, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Chloe Eng

    Location:  MH-2800 and online or +1 877 853 5247 (Meeting ID: 939 415 258)

     

  • Tuesday, February 27, 2018; 1:00 PM - 3:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Alon Vaisman

    Location:  MH-2500

     

  • Wednesday, February 28, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Small Group Discussion Section: Effect Modification
    Review of prior lecture and problem set 

    Faculty:  June Chan, Chloe Eng, Alon Vaisman

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406 and 1405

  • Friday, March 2, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Chloe Eng

    Location:  MH-2500 and online or +1 877 853 5247 (Meeting ID: 939 415 258)  

  • Monday, March 5, 2018; 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: June Chan

    Location:  MH-2500

     

  • Wednesday, March 7, 2018; 1:15 PM - 3:00 PM

    Small Group Discussion Section: Case-Control & Wrap Up
    Review of prior lecture and problem set 

    Faculty:  June Chan, Chloe Eng, Alon Vaisman

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406 and 1405


    REMINDER:  Please remember to register in advance for the Epid Tools workshop on 3/14, Dr. Jarvis Chen:    RSVP: http://bit.ly/2BzGzJy

    • Session Slides:

    • March 7 Wrap Up_Review Slides Wk8 File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Watch Live URL

    • Required Reading:

    • Optional Reading:

    • Analysis of Matched Case Control Studies BMJ 2016 Pearce et al URL
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

    • Assignments:

    • Assignment Answer Key (access restricted to registered students):

  • Friday, March 9, 2018; 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: Chloe Eng

    Location: online or +1 877 853 5247 (Meeting ID: 939 415 258)

    Please e-mail in advance!

     

  • Monday, March 12, 2018; 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM

    Office Hours
    Course faculty are available to address questions on course content including prior problem sets.

    Faculty: June Chan

    Location:  MH-6200

     

  • Wednesday, March 14, 2018; 1:15 PM - 5:00 PM

    Lecture: Geospatial Epidemiology - PLEASE REGISTER in ADVANCE HERE:   RSVP: http://bit.ly/2BzGzJy

    This workshop will introduce shared component models for modeling spatial variation in cancer disparities.

    Faculty:  Jarvis Chen

    Location:  Mission Hall 1406

    • Session Slides:

    • Session Audio/Video Recording (Access restricted to registered students):

    • Watch URL
      Not available unless: You belong to a group in Registered Students Only

    • Required Reading:

    • Optional Reading:

      Valeri L, Chen JT, Garcia-Albeniz X, Krieger N, VanderWeele TJ, Coull BA. The role of stage at diagnosis in colorectal cancer black-white survival disparities: a counterfactual causal inference approach. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2015. PubMed​

    • Chen JT et al. Mapping and Measuring Social Disparities in Premature Mortality. Journal of Urban Health. Vol.83. 1063-1084 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02
    • Rossen LM et al. Mapping Geographic Cariation in Infant Mortality and Related Black-White Disparities in the US. Epidemiology 2016 Sept. 27(5)690-696 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02
    • Chen JT. Multilevel and hierarchical models for disease mapping. Chapter 11 File
      Not available unless: Your ID number contains 02

    • Assignment:

  • Wednesday, March 14, 2018; Take-home Final Exam

    • Required Readings:

    • Satia et al AJE 2009 BetaCarotene and Lung CA in VITAL File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only
    • RIVUR Dataset for Q13_14_15 FINAL Exam File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only
    • Jain et al MMR and ASD Supplemental Content JAMA 2015 File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only
    • Take-Home Exam Assignment:
    • EPI207 FINAL EXAM DUE March 21_8PM File
      Not available unless: You belong to Registered Students Only

    • Final Exam Due Date: March 21, 2018 by 8:00 PM (20:00)

    • Final Exam submission Assignment