Nature, purpose, and methods in pharmacoepidemiology and their place in pharmacy and health policy. The general concepts in epidemiology and pharmacoepidemiology such as study population, drug exposure, basic measurements, quality of measurements, designs, bias and confounding factors.
Athena Title
Pharmacoepidemiology
Semester Course Offered
Offered spring
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Student learning Outcomes
Students will understand foundational concepts in pharmacoepidemiology
Students will describe the scope, history, and applications of pharmacoepidemiology in evaluating the use, safety, and effectiveness of medications in human populations.
Students will identify and compare common data sources
Students will evaluate strengths and limitations of various data sources used in pharmacoepidemiologic research, including administrative claims data, electronic health records, and national surveillance systems.
Students will apply appropriate study designs and analytic methods
Students will differentiate among cohort, case-control, cross-sectional, and experimental designs, and select appropriate designs for specific research questions.
Students will assess bias and confounding in observational studies
Students will identify and address key sources of bias (e.g., selection bias, immortal time bias) and confounding in pharmacoepidemiologic analyses.
Students will interpret pharmacoepidemiologic literature
Students will critically evaluate peer-reviewed research articles and assess the validity and implications of study findings.
Students will design and present an independent research project
Students will formulate a pharmacoepidemiologic research question, analyze real-world or secondary data, and communicate results through a written abstract and oral presentation.
Topical Outline
Epidemiology, Pharmacoepidemiology: Definitions and concepts and applications
Descriptive Measures: Proportions, rates, ratios, incidence prevalence, mortality rates, case fatality ratio
Quality of Measurement: Sensitivity, specificity, predictive value, validity, reliability
Measuring Drug Exposure: Importance of appropriate time-windows
Study Designs: Cohort studies, case-control studies, cross-sectional studies, experimental designs
Measurement Errors: Random errors, systematic errors, Type I and Type II errors
Bias: Selection bias, information bias, confounding bias
Control of Biases: By design, by analysis
Causality
Use of Databases in Pharmacoepidemiology
Clinical Epidemiology
Meta-Analysis
Epidemiologic Basis of Strategic Planning
Epidemiology of Cardiovascular Diseases
Evaluation of Health Care Programs: An Epidemiology Perspective
