28211 - DEMOGRAPHY, STATISTICS AND EPIDEMIOLOGY

Subject type: Basic

Coordinator: Montserrat Lamoglia Puig

Trimester: First term

Credits: 6

The subject of Demography, Epidemiology and Biostatistics is included in the basic training of the Degree in Nursing. It is taught in the first semester of the second year. This course will allow students to acquire the fundamental concepts and methods of Demography and Epidemiology, as well as know their usefulness and application in the field of health. The student will become familiar with the main designs of epidemiological studies that will allow the professional a critical reading of the scientific evidence and be able to design and carry out quality scientific research. Finally, they will learn the principles of statistics, at a basic level, which will allow them to read and interpret articles critically, as well as prepare scientific papers and conduct research in accordance with international standards. In this way, the subject will be structured in three thematic blocks: Demography, Epidemiology and Biostatistics.

This subject has methodological and digital resources to make possible its continuity in non-contact mode in the case of being necessary for reasons related to the Covid-19. In this way, the achievement of the same knowledge and skills that are specified in this teaching plan will be ensured.

The TecnoCampus will make available to teachers and students the digital tools needed to carry out the course, as well as guides and recommendations that facilitate adaptation to the non-contact mode.

LO 2. Know different types of computer programs.

LO 23. Use the most common statistical techniques applied to population studies.

LO 24. Samples and populations. Sampling techniques.

LO 25. Define the basic demographic concepts: mortality, birth rate, migration, aging.

LO 26. Describe sources of demographic data.

LO 27. Calculate and interpret the usual demographic indicators.

LO 28. Recognize and interpret statistical language appropriately.

LO 29. Identify the characteristics of a community.

LO 30. Know the most common statistical techniques applied to population studies.

LO 31. Know the measures of frequency of health problems and identify the designs of epidemiological studies.

LO 37. Understand the concept and evolution of public health.

Regarding the training activities and the methodology used in them, the following table summarizes them including the credits assigned to each of the activities and competencies that are worked on. The aim of this combination of activities is for the student to play an active role in their educational cycle (carrying out the exercises and assignments, participating in classes and seminars, ...) and to interact with the rest of their classmates (in the problem solving, doubts, ...). This methodology aims to encourage critical thinking and the ability to work in a team.

The characteristics of the different activities are described below:

Plenary sessions (lectures)

They present and describe in a structured and systematic way the fundamental concepts and contents of the program. They are developed with all students and last 1 hour and 45 minutes (includes 1 hour and 35 minutes of presentation and 5-10 minutes of recapitulation and resolution of doubts / questions of students). The program is designed sequentially, to which the concepts and skills acquired in one lesson pass on to the following.

Seminars

Their purpose is the discussion and in-depth analysis of different methodological aspects of the syllabus through the presentation, discussion and interpretation of practical cases. They take place in small groups and last approximately 1 hour. They will be started once the master class block has been completed.

Work in group

They aim for students to create a database after the explanation in a master class.

Virtual Campus (Moodle)

Students will have at their disposal on the virtual campus (Moodle) all the informative documentation of the subject (program and bibliography) and different teaching support materials: PDF of the presentations used by the teacher in the master classes, scripts of seminars, some of the complementary readings and web links.

Tutorials

Students will be able to receive personalized attention and discuss with the teacher during the consultation hours previously announced or with prior agreement.

1. STATIC DEMOGRAPHY: Presentation of the course: program, work methodology and evaluation. Concept of demography, static and dynamic demography, human populations, sources of information (the census and the census), websites of interest (INE and IDESCAT) and presentation, analysis and interpretation of data (the age pyramids)
2. DYNAMIC DEMOGRAPHY: Birth and fecundity, global mortality, age-specific and cause-specific mortality, preventable mortality, potential years of life lost, life expectancy.
3. TAX STANDARDIZATION: standardization of fees by the direct method and by the indirect method. Exercises 1.
4. Browsing the IDESCAT and INE websites.
5. MIGRATION: Population growth, population aging, migratory movements and population policies (fertility, aging and migration).
6. FREQUENCY MEASUREMENTS: Prevalence, cumulative incidence, incidence density. Exercises for its estimation. TYPES OF VARIABLES: qualitative and quantitative variables, measurement, reliability, accuracy and validity. Exercises 2.
7. ASSOCIATION MEASURES and IMPACT MEASURES: relative risk (RR), oddsratio (OR), attributable risk (RA), etiological fraction. Exercises for estimating. Exercises 3.
8. CONFUSION. Concept of confusion and methods for its detection and elimination (stratified analysis). Examples. Exercises 4.
9. INTERACTION or modification of the effect. Concept of interaction and methods for its detection. Examples. Exercises 5.
10. APPROACH TO EPIDEMIOLOGICAL STUDIES: Criteria for their classification, characteristics of the various types of designs, advantages and limitations.
11. DIAGNOSTIC TESTS: Concepts of “goldstandard”, sensitivity, specificity, predictive values ​​(positive and negative) and ROC curves. Exercises 6.
12. PARTIAL TEST 1st block (demography and epidemiology). Continued avaluation.
13. DATA COLLECTION AND QUESTIONNAIRES: How to prepare a data collection notebook: selection of variables, definition of variables, measurement scales, sources of information. Data quality. Types of questionnaires (self-administered, ...), types of questions, validation of questionnaires.
14. DATA MANAGEMENT: Database concept. How to create an electronic database with ACCESS.
15. ACCESS SEMINAR: Guided practices with ACCESS (create a database with Access)
16. DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS: Description of quantitative variables: measures of central tendency (mean, median and mode) and measures of dispersion (standard deviation, range, quartiles). Description of quantitative variables: percentages.
17. SEMINAR DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS AND DATA PURIFICATION: How to interpret frequency tables and the results of descriptive analyzes of the SPSS. Case studies.
18. SAMPLING AND BASIC CONCEPTS OF INFERENTIAL STATISTICS I: Random sampling, standard error, confidence intervals. Exercises 7.
19. BASIC CONCEPTS OF INFERENTIAL STATISTICS II: Type 1 or alpha error, type 2 or beta error, statistical power, level of statistical significance (p), calculation of sample size. Exercises 8.
20. MAIN HYPOTHESIS CONTRAST TESTS: Comparison of means (T-Student, U-Mann Whitney, ANOVA) and comparison of proportions (Khi squared, exact test of Fisher and McNemar).
21. PROPORTION COMPARISON SEMINAR. How to interpret the results of the SPS proportional comparison analyzes. Case studies.
22. AVERAGE COMPARISON SEMINAR. How to interpret the results of SPSS mean comparison analyzes. Case studies.
23. LINEAR AND LOGISTICS REGRESSION. Concept and interpretation of single and multiple linear regression analyzes and simple and multiple logistic regression analyzes. Practical examples.
24. LINEAR AND LOGISTICS REGRESSION SEMINAR. How to interpret the results of the linear regression and logistic regression analyzes of the SPSS. Case studies.
25. SURVIVAL ANALYSIS. Concept and interpretation of survival analysis and Kaplan-Meier tables. Practical examples.
26. Concept and interpretation of METALANALYSIS. Practical examples.
27. PARTIAL TEST 2nd block (Biostatistics). Continued avaluation.

Continuous assessment (45% of the final grade of the subject)

• Partial test of demography and epidemiology (12% of the final grade). It does not release matter.
• Partial biostatistics test: (20% of the final grade). It does not release matter.
• Individual exercises (8): 8% of the final grade (1% each exercise)
• BBDD Access (in group): 5% of the final grade

Compulsory final exam (55% of the final grade of the subject if a score ≥4 is obtained).

If you get a score below 4 on the final exam or if you get a score below 5 on the overall assessment you will have to go to the resit exam. In this case, the resit exam will continue to weigh 55% of the final grade (the remaining 45% will continue to be that of the continuous assessment).

The test that can be recovered in the case of failing the course is the final exam (not the continuous assessment).

NOTE: According to UPF regulations, students who have the option of retrieving the subject are those who have obtained a "suspended" grade, which are the only ones that can be modified in the recovery process.

The total or partial copy in any of the learning activities will mean a "Not Presented" in the subject, without option to present in the proof of recovery and without prejudice of the opening of a file for this reason.