Epidemiologic Measures, Surveillance, Prevention

This unit develops applied skills for measuring disease burden, conducting surveillance, and implementing prevention strategies. Students will learn to identify at-risk populations, calculate common rates, run surveillance and screening activities, and apply causal reasoning and ethical considerations to public health problems.

Learning Objectives

• Analyze demographic data and population pyramids to identify at-risk groups and calculate crude morbidity and crude mortality rates using standard formulas
• Apply and differentiate types of surveillance by selecting an appropriate system, performing step-by-step case-finding procedures, and explaining how makeshift hospitals support surge capacity
• Evaluate screening tests and prevention strategies by assessing test attributes (sensitivity, specificity), distinguishing primary/secondary/tertiary prevention, and interpreting childhood vaccination schedules for disease prevention
• Demonstrate epidemiologic reasoning by applying Hill’s criteria and Rothman’s causal pie, designing a cross-sectional study that addresses confounding, and articulating ethical and environmental/climate influences on disease patterns