Descriptive and Analytical Epidemiology

Both descriptive and analytical epidemiology are important for advancing clinical medicine and public health. Descriptive epidemiology assesses the burden and magnitude of health problems in a population, whereas analytical epidemiology identifies the causes and risk factors of health problems. This chapter provides the scopes, designs, data analytics approaches, ethical issues, and examples of various epidemiological studies. Descriptive epidemiological studies include: (1) case reports, (2) case series, (3) descriptive cross-sectional (prevalence) studies, and (4) descriptive cohort (incidence) studies. Analytical epidemiological studies include: (a) observational studies, such as (1) ecological studies (correlational studies), (2) analytical cross-sectional studies, (3) analytical cohort studies (prospective and retrospective), and (4) case–control studies, and (b) experimental studies, such as (1) community-based interventions and (2) clinical trials.