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Dear Students --
Welcome to Epi 204: Clinical Epidemiology! We will go over logistics for the course on the first day of class, 9/17/14, so this letter primarily is to give you a little more advanced notice about how the course will work, to introduce you to the course website, and to refer you the first assignment there.
1. The website for the course is: http://www.epibiostat.ucsf.edu/courses/schedule/clinical_epi.html The website is easy to find by following the 'Education" link from the UCSF Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics website, or you can just type "Epi 204" into Google. The course website has the schedule for the quarter, the syllabus, assignments, contact information, etc.
2. All classes will meet Thursday mornings (except Thanksgiving 11/26/15) at Mission Hall Room 1400. The lecture is from 8:45 (sharp) to 10:15 AM in Room 1400; the 4 sections are 1:00 - 2:30 PM in 2105, 2106, 2107, and 2108.. Please do try to be there on time.
3. Sections will be led by our 4 stellar teaching assistants, Sachin Garg, Emily Larimer, Mariya Samoylova and Michael Wilson with faculty back-up from Christine Dehlendorf, Martina Steurer, Michael Kohn and me. Sections will be primarily to review homework due that day. We will also tell you the problems assigned for the next week in section. (We choose them at our faculty lunch right before.) You can (or soon will be able to) find your section by clicking on Roster on the course website. It is courteous but not required to let your section leader know if you’re going to miss a class. (Grades are based on written work, not attendance.)
4. The textbook for this class is "Evidence-based Diagnosis” written by Michael Kohn and me. You may be able to buy or borrow a used one from someone who took the class a previous year. Olivia also has a few I've donated to the TICR program for use while you are at Mission Hall. Books are available online from Amazon, E-Bay and other sellers, currently for about $66.
5. The homework assignments will all be posted on the course website. Please read Chapter 1 before the first lecture and at least think about the Chapter 1 problems before the first section. You won't need to turn in answers to the problems for Chapter 1, but we will discuss them in section. If you are someone who likes to read new material before hearing about it, you should also read Chapter 2 up to (but not including) Reliability of Continuous Measurements.
On behalf of all of the course instructors (and the whole TICR team), we're looking forward to the course and to getting to know you.
Tom Newman
Thomas B. Newman, MD, MPH
Professor of Epidemiology & Biostatistics and Pediatrics, UCSF
US or Campus Mail
UCSF Dept. of Epi. & Biostat., Box 0560
550 16th Street, 2nd Floor
San Francisco, CA 94143
Commercial deliveries (FedEx, etc.):
UCSF Dept. of Epi. & Biostat., Box 0560
550 16th Street, 2nd Floor
San Francisco, CA 94158
415 514-8007 (voice)
415 514-8150 (fax)