OTH 520 Week 4 Ticket to Class

Active Learning Guide and Professional Reasoning

Name: _Andrea Padilla___________________ Date:_9/16/2023__________

YouTube Video: Intro to Epidemiology: Crash Course Public Health #6

1. What is epidemiology? Why is it used to understand health trends?
The study of patterns of disease and health conditions within populations. It also studies the
patterns’ causes and how they can be controlled.

2. What are non-communicable causes of death? Provide an example of one Social

Determinant of Health (SDoH) that could be associated with a non-communicable
disease/cause of death.
Cardiovascular disease such as heart attacks, cancers, respiratory diseases and diabetes.
Environmental factors like air population and natural disasters.
One social determinant of health that can be associated with a non-communicable disease is
economic stability.
3. Describe health outcomes in your own words.
Health outcomes are the results of one’s health status. Health outcomes can be either positive
or negative.

4. List and briefly describe the two main study types in epidemiology.
Experimental studies investigators expose individuals to a certain intervention, they then
compare that to a controlled group who wasn’t exposed. For ethical purposes only positive
interventions can be used
Observational studies observe a particular group who is already exposed to a particular
treatment or risk factor. And compare their health to a group who isn’t.

5. What are ethical risks associated with studies that require an intervention?
You need to make sure that you are not harming individuals so you can only use positive
interventions.

6. Why is it difficult to conduct epidemiology studies? Describe the challenge of cause and
effect.
Conducting epidemiology studies are difficult to conduct because you need to keep
ethics in mind. An epidemic also happens very quickly so people need to work fast and
that can often be difficult since there are many complexities to consider. The challenge
of cause and effect is that correlation doesn’t always mean causation. Reading data can
be a little difficult and sometimes even though we see a correlation it doesn’t mean that
it is related to causation.
 7. What ingredients are in a Rothman’s Causal Pie? Feel free to use your own example or
the example from the video.

 Component causes – overcrowded home and communities, exposure to

mycobacterium tuberculosis, poor ventilation, compromised immune system,
lack of access to tb vaccine.
 Necessary/sufficient condition/cause –
Exposure of mycobacterium of tb

YouTube Video: What is Epidemiology?

1. Why do we use epidemiology in public health?
The science of understanding of what we are exposed to or what we do may affect the overall
health of society.

2. Describe why correlation does not mean causation (include bias and confounder
factors).

Correlation does not mean causation because there is factor that can be misleading when trying
to determine a causation one example are biases. Bias occurs when there are errors in design or
a study. Another factor that can cause us to be misled are confounders. This is where other
factors confuse interpretations of exposure and outcome.
3. Why is a p-value not always the most reliable method to determine probability of health
outcomes?
The p value does not help examine how strong the association is or how important the
health implications are. Low p values can also be misleading.

4. Ask yourself, “So what?” As you review the websites and OT article provided this week,
think about the Intro to Epi videos and the connection between SDoH, social and
occupational justice, and how it intertwines with health outcomes. Take a few minutes
to list out your initial thoughts and reactions to the information provided. Come to class
prepared to dive deeper into using our OT framework to understand epidemiology,
health equity, JEDI, and how we can advocate for health equity through occupational
justice.