Dr.Petitti's lecture on Research methods

Content
The lecture on "Research Methods" by Dr.Petitti left me with a very different experience. Her explanation using specific biomedical examples to elaborate the importance of statistical measures was really interesting. The lectures mainly focused on the estimation and interpretation of Risk ratio and Odds ratio, given a medical condition. The concept of experimental validity is also discussed. It is really difficult to validate a study because technology keeps broadening, tracking of research subjects might become challenging and various other factors come into play.

The example on occurence of Coronary Heart Disease with drinking or non-drinking clearly explained that Risk ratio of occurence with drinking is the inverse of Risk ratio of occurence with non-drinking. Another example discussed was on implication of brain cancer with cellphone exposure using Odds ratio estimates. The number of sample members included in the study (sample size) has a key role in the efficacy and in estimating the statistical significance of a study.

Posted by
Harsha Undapalli