Epidemiology

Code:

CN41006

Acronym:

EPIDEM

Keywords
Classification	Keyword
OFICIAL	Social Science
OFICIAL	Health Sciences

Instance: 2020/2021 - 1S

Active?	Yes
Web Page:	https://moodle.up.pt/course/view.php?id=175
Course/CS Responsible:	Nutrition Sciences

Cycles of Study/Courses

Acronym	No. of Students	Study Plan	Curricular Years	Credits UCN	Credits ECTS	Contact hours	Total Time
CNUP	69	Plano oficial	4	-	5,5	56	148,5

Teaching language

Suitable for English-speaking students

Objectives

The main objective of Epidemiology, within the context of Nutrition Sciences, is to investigate the contribution of diet and other factors in the disease and its treatment. This is an exciting area of study because it shed light on the potential causes and preventive strategies of the disease. It also allows the quantitative evaluation of clinical practice, which enables the implementation of nutritional treatment based on scientific evidence.

Although Nutritional Epidemiology is a relatively new branch of Epidemiology, researchers used the basic epidemiological methods in the identification of essential nutrients more than two centuries ago. But only in the last three decades has there been a substantial development of this branch of epidemiology, which arose from the increasing need to respond quantitatively to the relationship between diet and health.

Nutritional Epidemiology uses epidemiological methods to determine the associations between dietary factors and the occurrence of specific diseases. The complex nature of food intake and the variety of exposures require special expertise to choose the most appropriate way to assess it. The effects of dietary intake may also be modified or confounded by other exposures, which are related to living habits. The quantification of the independent effect of nutrition and the impact of these factors must be considered, ensuring the quality of information on which Clinic and Public Health decisions are made.

This course is presented as both an objective and scientific method of problem-solving and also all the results obtained by applying this method. It is our aim that students acquire knowledge and skills at different levels, that are required to use Epidemiology and Epidemiological thought with proficiency in the workplace. 

Learning outcomes and competences

1. Skills related to general knowledge. 

To know the frequency of nutrition-related diseases in human populations, to identify and interpret the significance of risk factors, and to recognize the importance of its prevention, its control, and its treatment. 
Identify priority prevention strategies for health promotion. 
Learn to collect and to evaluate the quality of the scientific information in Epidemiology. To use Epidemiology in health care and public health policy development. 

2. Skills related to specific knowledge: identify problems, studies design, and research conduction. 

To identify health problems and to formulate hypotheses about the association between diet, nutrition, and states of disease and its treatments. 
Know how to choose between the different possibilities in the design of studies. To define a population, select the sampling process and recruitment of participants. Understanding the basic rules in their implementation and acquire basic skills in analysis and interpretation of data. Evaluate the major sources of errors and how to implement strategies in quality control. To be able to prepare a draft of a research protocol. To recognize the ethical issues inherent in epidemiological research. 

3. Skills related to data interpretation, information, communication, and consultancy. 

Learn to critically interpret data from epidemiologic studies and to critically analyze the scientific press. To be able to prepare a draft of a scientific article. Learn to convey the results to the scientific community, the public, and the media. Learn how to make a scientific judgment in a particular context. 

4. Competencies related to professional conduct. 

Know how to use scientific evidence in making decisions in professional life. To be able to maintain an ethical and responsible professional conduct.

Working method

Presencial

Pre-requirements (prior knowledge) and co-requirements (common knowledge)

Program

Module 1: Epidemiology and its background in a Nutrition Degree Course.

1.1 Presentation of the Curricular Unit. Objectives and methods.
1.2 Epidemiology. Concept and historical perspective. The emergence of Nutritional Epidemiology and Clinical Epidemiology.

Module 2: Nutritional Epidemiology.

2.1 Descriptive and analytical Epidemiology. Types of observational studies, quasi-experimental, and experimental studies. The systematic reviews and meta-analysis.
2.2 The measurement of food consumption in Epidemiology: the nature of variation in food intake, retrospective, and prospective methods, the use of biological markers in the assessment of nutritional intake, the validity, and reproducibility of estimates of intake and the assessment in the distant past, the importance of evaluating total energy intake, its consideration in the analysis of data and the residual method, the use of alternative respondents. The gene-nutrient interaction in Nutritional Epidemiology.
2.3 The measures of association.
2.4 The bias, confounding variables, and modifiers of effect. Effects and solutions.
2.5 Sampling, a study size, and statistical power.
2.6 Ethical issues.
2.7 Design of a study and its conduction.
2.8 Interpretation of the epidemiological investigation. Criteria for causal inference.
2.9 Investigation of an outbreak of food-borne illness.

Module 3: The Clinical Epidemiology.

3.1 The choice and interpretation of diagnostic tests. The sensitivity, specificity, predictive value, and likelihood ratios. Screening.
3.2 The prognosis, treatment, and decision based on scientific evidence. The effectiveness of an intervention.

Module 4. Seminars on the role of epidemiological studies in determining the causal relations between diet and disease and on current priorities and challenges in epidemiology.
4.1 The epidemiology of disease-related undernutrition;
4.2 The measurement of anthropometric and body composition in epidemiology;
4.3 The nutritional epidemiology of cancer;
4.4 The nutritional epidemiology of cardiovascular diseases; 
4.5 Other topics.

Mandatory literature

Dabiv D. Celentano; Gordis epidemiology. ISBN: 978-0-323-55229-5
Fletcher Robert H.; Clinical epidemiology. ISBN: 978-1-4511-4447-5
Willett Walter; Nutritional epidemiology. ISBN: 978-0-19-975403-8
International Epidemiological Association; A Dictionary of Epidemiology, Miquel Porta, 2014. ISBN: ISBN: 9780199976737

Complementary Bibliography

Margetts Barrie 340; Design concepts in nutritional epidemiology. ISBN: 0-19-262739-2

Teaching methods and learning activities

Lectures methodologies:

The interactive course will consist of lectures, debates and discussions, and practical work. Students are invited to answer questions and to express and justify their opinion. The teaching of this curricular unit is articulated as if it were a "puzzle" composed of several pieces, which are presented so that the final image is well visible even before the end of the school year. Students are asked and encouraged to contribute to topics discussion, being their creativity stimulated.

Laboratory classes methodologies:

1. guided reading, interpretation, and discussion of scientific articles, with particular emphasis on actual controversies. Recent articles published by FCNAUP faculty members, Porto University and other Portuguese universities, are used for different types of exercises. In order to promote innovation and cross-sectional discussions, we work on scientific articles that are being discussed elsewhere in other curricular units.
2. small group assignment: data tabulation, problem-solving, and data analysis, using data collected by colleagues in Academic Internship, allowing a hands-on experience.
3. Designing questionnaires, planning coding responses, data collection, and data computer storage. Results tabulation, categories selection, and participants classification;
4. Diet consumption nutritional analysis. Adjustment for total energy intake by the residuals method.

We use the following strategies for enriching the study:

1. anticipating the end of the program, local experts are invited to present their own research data, which are used as examples in later classes;
2. news recently transmitted by the media and also the scientific articles that are in their origin are discussed in laboratory classes;
3. laboratory classes are held in computer rooms, which allows access to publications databases, the use of statistical (and other) software and viewing slides and scripts from the Moodle lessons;
4. to prevent the transcription of the slides, they are placed online on the Moodle course website;
5. a period for Q&A is scheduled weekly with students;
6. students are invited to attend relevant conferences, doctorates, or masters. It is expected that all students participate and promote a discussion on the topic in the next class.

Software

SPSS
Moodle
Microssoft Office

keywords

Health sciences

Evaluation Type

Distributed evaluation without final exam

Assessment Components

Designation	Weight (%)
Teste	100,00
Participação presencial	0,00
Total:	100,00

Amount of time allocated to each course unit

Designation	Time (hours)
Estudo autónomo	52,50
Frequência das aulas	56,00
Trabalho laboratorial	40,00
Total:	148,50

Eligibility for exams

To obtain the attendance to this Course, the student will have to fulfill attendance to the laboratory classes.

According to the legislation, "it is considered that a student meets attendance (...) if he does not exceed the limit number of absences, corresponding to 25% of the classes of Laboratory type".

If the student reaches or exceeds this limit of the absences to the laboratory classes, he will fail the component of the distributed evaluation.

 

Calculation formula of final grade

The distributed evaluation consists of two tests (weighting each one of 50% for the final classification). It is necessary to obtain half of the total mark in each one of the two tests.

The calculation of the Final Classification (FC) is made from the mark of the distributed evaluation that is composed of two Tests, as follows:

Final Classification (100%) = Test 1 (50%) + Test 2 (50%)

Alternatively, there is a possibility of a final exam in the "Época Normal" class and also in the "Época de Recurso", which consists of a test with theoretical and practical components that focus on the whole syllabus and all the minimum grade is 9.5 in 20 values.

Examinations or Special Assignments

Special assessment (TE, DA, ...)

Attendance at laboratory classes is mandatory. These students will have as an alternative to attending the laboratory classes, the possibility of carrying out laboratory works to be combined with the professor.

Classification improvement

Mark obtained at distributed evaluation may be subject to assessment or improvement of the classification at "Época Normal" and at “Época de Recurso”.

Observations

The contents of the course are on the Moodle platform, accessible to all students of Epidemiology.

The students' tutorial period will be agreed at the beginning of the semester.