Causal Inference in Medicine

Code:

MI008

Acronym:

MI008

Instance: 2012/2013 - SP

Active?	Yes
Responsible unit:	Department of Health Information and Decision Sciences Department
Course/CS Responsible:	Integrated Master in Medicine

Cycles of Study/Courses

Acronym	No. of Students	Study Plan	Curricular Years	Credits UCN	Credits ECTS	Contact hours	Total Time
MIMED	0	Mestrado Integrado em Medicina 2007	6	-	1,5	32

Teaching language

Portuguese

Objectives

The study of causal effects is a key task in health research. When studying the disease etiology or a new treatment efficacy it is fundamental to understand that association is not the same as causation. In recent years, there has been substantial development of methods and approaches to study causality. In this course unit we will introduce basic concepts and general framework of causal inference and describe appropriate methods to study causal relations.

After this course unit the students should be able to: recognize and formulate research questions regarding causation; graphically represent the prior knowledge of a particular topic; recognize situations where conventional statistical methods are inappropriate to establish causal relations.

Program

Definition of causal effect and association; estimation of causal effects in randomized and observational studies; graphical representation of causal effects; bias; introduction to marginal structural models.

Mandatory literature

Judea Pearl; Causality: Models, Reasoning and Inference, Cambridge University Press, 2000

Teaching methods and learning activities

The course unit will have a total duration of 15 hours; 10 hours of theoretical classes and 5 hours of theoretical-practical classes. After the presentation of each topic there will be time to solve exercises and group discussion. An e-learning platform will be used to deliver class notes and to facilitate the communication between students and teaching staff.
Duration: 1 week

Evaluation Type

Distributed evaluation with final exam

Assessment Components

Description	Type	Time (hours)	Weight (%)	End date
Attendance (estimated)	Participação presencial	0,00
	Total:	-	0,00

Calculation formula of final grade

The final grade will be based on the result of a theoretical exam (14 points) and practical exercise (6 points).

Examinations or Special Assignments

There is no special assignments.

Special assessment (TE, DA, ...)

In accordance with the rules approved by FMUP.

Classification improvement

In accordance with the rules approved by FMUP.