DIALOGUE AND DISCUSSION ON EDUCATION, ENVIRONMENT AND RACE
The text in parentheses explains what relationship the words in this poem have to the concepts in epidemiology and stats... these are some tough relationships to remember but I thought that using something I like to do (writing poems and lyrics) would help me learn this high level math. Hope you can use this to assist you. It may not help you or make sense to you but it really has helped me.
Namaska
I'm trying to get a PhD
I took statistics but they still tryna school me
to evaluate the health of the community
I was forced to take epidemiology
Now what does it mean
Epidemiology's purpose is to halt or prevent disease
Improves health
In not just one but everybody (ind vs population)
The gold standard is a RCT (randomized clinical trial)
For evaluating
New treatments,interventions and screenings
Some times we wanna see
If its better than old things (use epi to evaluate screening programs)
But I gotta be careful
Pick my subjects right
So my study is replicable
My criteria must be precise (selection of participants to prevent bias)
I don’t know where they will go
some over here over there (randomization)
I study series in a case
If I don’t compare (case studies and series)
But sometimes I should
To check the relation
If the treatment made a difference
What caused the assumption?(importance of RCT)
Then I try to control
With historical groves (historical controls)
And at the same time select my folks out of control (simultaneous randomized control groups)
Pick a day, pick a month, pick a time pick a year
Whatever so I don’t see who you are my dear (blinding)
Because if I know might be inclined to pick a side my dear (bias)
So I flip a coin
Tails or head
More likely that they’ll be
Representative(randomization)
So I match what I know and on those things control
Age, black or white … stratify like clothes (lol stratified randomization based on a characteristic)
I crossover like a ball player
But I washout before
I play on another team
And I feel my own control (crossover groups receive both treatments and serve as their own contols)
Now here comes the fun when the hypothesis is done
Do I accept or reject
I choose the outcome
From four possibilities
O what have I done
There’s a difference but I said there was none
type 1 error man what have I done
If I say that it is and there really isnt
type 2 on my mind man I did it again ( the two types of errors in stats are type 1 and type 2)
Probability I make
Errors mistakes
what do you say?
Alpha is the first (type 1 stats use alpha symbol)
The second B.E.T.A (type 2 stats use beta symbol)
Alpha is first...also is p
The value of 0.5 or less I like to see ( this value denotes statistical significance)
I'm like public enemny
To fight the power that be
In my study Take away 1 from B (1 subtract beta)
If its hi this tells me (power)
How strong the difference is in my study (correctly id difference)
And also how many people I need (sample size)
First I gotta set my expectations
Estimate response to move to perfection
I’m satisfied if alpha <0.1 or 0.5
Now the question
Do I do one or do I figure 2 sides( one direction or both directions on a normal distribution curve)
If its effective I put every body and take away over the fake (placebo-tx/placebo)- chks efficacy
And this will tell me if what I did worked or if it’s a waste
The number I need to treat prevents people from going away
From death or disease I wish they all could stay
The number needed to harm
Tells me who else could be harmed
Don’t wanna feel no cold just wanna stay warm
Validate from withing make sure everythings done right
Validate send it out
generalize hope it works out!
So they made me take it
And I gotta learn it
They won't give it to me
so I gotta earn it
Gettin my PhD
A scientist I must be
gotta lot to figure out
plus I wanna lot of cheese...
Comment
So basically epidemiology is the study of populations. Statistics denotes characteristics of samples. Symbols and formulas used for statistics dependend on whether a sample or population is being described. A population includes all members in a defined group; a sample is a subset of a population. characteristics of a population is called parameter- characteristics of samples are called statistics... to distinguish them different symbols are used; usually lower case Greek letters denote parameters and Roman letters denote stats... There lies some of the differences between epidemiology and statistics .
There are several study designs out there but the gold standard or best design is termed a randomized control trial or RCT. This is also referred to as an experimental design. What does this mean. The test relationship of these variables one must conduct an experiment. To do this in an unbiased manner the scientist would first need to randomize the groups before the intervention. This is like tossing a coin and putting all that land on heads in one group and all that land on tails in another. This is a form of control a researcher uses to make sure that the result that is given is not only "by chance" After the groups are randomized...the researcher would want to match on characteristics we "know are related to a dependent variable" such as age, race, weight, etc. ( this is called matching ). Sometimes a researcher does not have enough subjects to do a RCT , so they will use a crossover design in which they subjects serve as their own control. It would be unethical to use this in certain cases, (such as with HIV experimentation, investigation of lung cancer) but this type of design could be used if one wants to test two different interventions. For example... say I have a person who takes care of a patient with alzheimers who is depressed (this is tested by validated/reliable instruments). I want to help people deal with or eliminate depression... but how?? How do you know what is effective and what is not... ??
After it is assessed that they are depressed we give the group education about alzheimers disease (how to manage the patient, respite care etc.); the test for depression is taken again and scored; then for a period of time the group has to go through what is termed a washout... to make sure that no "residual" effects are present after first intervention. Then they are given a focus group intervention tailored for reflections, self awareness, etc... and tested for depression again. This is an example of a crossover study.
When a researcher samples, cases are selected from a predetermined population ; everything can not be controlled so the sample may deviate from the defined population's true nature - this is deviation is called a sampling error - thus inferences from samples to populations are always PROBAILISTIC... always... drawing wrong conclusion is called an error of inference... there are two types of erros... type 1 and type 2.
if the null hypothesis is true and is accepted the response is correct.
if the null is true but is rejected this is called a type 1 error (alpha)
if the null is false and is rejected this is correct response
if null is false and is accepted this is type 2 error. (beta)
to decrease probability of making a type 1 error (which could be detrimental) the researcher sets a significance level called p value at 0.05 then there would be 5 chances in 100 ; setting significance also determines power of the test...
IMPORTANT NOTE
Measures like this test what works and what doesn't and in what type of person or populaton it works and does not work in .... People claim that certain things work for certain ailments with no proof. such as taking simylarin(milk thistle) for hepatitis c ... RCT show no evidence that it is effective but people claim that it works based off anectodotal information (just cuz a nigga told you so lol) I have seen where people will rely on something they beleive will work and it just doesnt) ... I've had patients who used this with no change in quantitative viral replication of HCV RNA... it actually continues to rise with the use of this... so this math is a way to "true" results... Stats is not perfect
any way this can get confusin and my poem helped me ...lol
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