Case-Control Study

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Step 6: Seminar Discussion Questions

Carefully consider the following questions related to your work above. Write down your answers and be prepared to discuss them during the seminar session.

  1. Why is the selection of controls important? What methods of control selection do you know?  What principles should we follow when selecting controls?
  2. What are the limitations of using questionnaires to assess exposure status in study subjects? What kind of bias could be introduced by the use of questionnaires in determining exposure status? If present, what could be the effects of this bias on the study findings? Does our study design limit or avoid this bias?
  3. Epidemiologic case-control studies often report increased risk of an event given exposure, but we know that we can only calculate the odds ratio in a case-control study as opposed to a risk ratio.  Is it important to distinguish between a risk ratio and an odds ratio?  When does Odds Ratio approximate the Risk Ratio? When does it approximate the Rate Ratio?

Questions for the Intellectually Curious

  1. What is a “Nested Case-Control” study, and what advantage does this design offer over the study we have proposed?
Introduction   >   Learning
Objectives		   >   Student
Role		   >   Study
Design		   >   Data
Collection		   >   Data
Analysis		   >   Discussion
Questions		      
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