Introduction to biostatistics

1. Biostatistics as a scientific industry

2. Basic Concepts
3. Classification, collection and provision of data
4. Conclusion
5. Literature
 Biostatistics as a scientific industry

Statistics is the science of collection, presentation

and analysis of data.
Biostatistics is a branch of science related to the
development and use of statistical methods in scientific
research in medicine, public health and epidemiology.
 Biostatistics is divided into two sections:
• Descriptive biostatistics
• Analytical biostatistics (Inferential biostatistics)

The purpose of descriptive biostatistics is the collection and

systematization of data on the research subject. It includes methods
allowing to present the data in a compact and easy-to-understand form.
This could include tables, graphs, frequency (absolute and relative)
measures of Central tendency (mean, median, mode) and measures of
dispersion (variance, standard deviation, interquartile range, etc.).
 Analytical biostatistics aims to obtain statistical
inference on the basis of collected and systematized
information about the object of study. This stage is
called "testing statistical hypotheses".
 Basic Concepts

Population and sample are two basic concepts of statistics.

Population can be characterized as the set of individual persons
or objects in which an investigator is primarily interested during
his or her research problem. Sometimes wanted measurements
for all individuals in the population are obtained, but often only a
set of individuals of that population are observed; such a set of
individuals constitutes a sample.
This gives us the following definitions of population and sample.

Definition 1 - Population. Population is the collection of all individuals

or items under consideration in a statistical study.

Definition 2- Sample. Sample is that part of the population from which

information is collected.
 Variables

A characteristic that varies from one person or thing to

another is called a variable, i.e, a variable is any
characteristic that varies from one individual member of the
population to another.

Examples of variables for humans are height, weight,

number of siblings, sex, marital status and eye color.

The first three of these variables yield numerical

information (yield numerical measurements) and are
examples of Quantitative (or numerical) variables, last
three yield non-numerical information (yield non-numerical
measurements) and are examples of Qualitative (or
categorical) variables.
Quantitative variables can be classified as either discrete
or continuous.

Discrete variables. Some variables, such as the numbers

of children in family, the numbers of car accident on the
certain road on different days, or the numbers of students
taking basics of statistics course are the results of
counting and thus these are discrete variables.
Continuous variables.

Quantities such as length, weight, or temperature

can in principle be measured arbitrarily accurately.
There is no indivible unit.
Weight may be measured to the nearest gram, but
it could be measured more accurately, say to the
tenth of a gram. Such a variable, called continuous,
is intrinsically different from a discrete variable.
 In biostatistics there are several ways (characteristics) for assessing a
characteristic of the sample (or the population) as a whole.
They are divided into point features (measures of location) and
characteristics of variation (measures of spread).

Point features measure the Central tendency of the trait in the sample or
the population and include:
• The Moda
• The Median
• The Average (Mean)
The characteristics of the variation necessary to
estimate the distribution (grouping) of values rather
found of Central tendency, or in other words to
determine the reliability characteristics of Central
tendency.

The characteristics of variation are:

• The swing (Range)
• Standard deviation (Average linear deviation)
• Dispersion (Dispersion)
• Scale quartiles (Inter-quartile range)
 Descriptive biostatistics
Measures of center

MEAN The sample mean of the variable is the sum of

observed values in a data divided by the number
of observations.
n

x
i 1
i
X 
n
MEDIAN
What does it mean?
It is the point which has half the values above, and half
below.
EXAMPLE
Using the last example of five patients aged 52, 55, 56, 58
and 59. The median age is 56, the same as the mean –
half the women are older, half are younger.
However, in the second example with six patients aged 52,
55, 56, 58, 59 and 92 years. There are two “middle”
ages, 56 and 58. the median is half-way between these,
i.e. 57 years
MODE
What does it mean?
The mode is the most common of a set of events.
EXAMPLE. An eye clinic sister noted eye-colour of
100 consecutive patients. The results are shown
here:
In this case the mode is a brown,
the commonest eye colour.
 Measures of variation
Range
The sample range of the variable is the
difference between its maximum and
minimum values in a data set:
Range = Max −Min.

8 participants in bike race had the following

finishing times in minutes:
28,22,26,29,21,23,24,50.
What is the range?
Interquartile range

The quartiles of thevariable divide the observed values

into quarters, or 4 equal parts.
The variable has three quartiles, denoted by Q1,Q2 and
Q3.

• the first quartile, Q1, is the number that divides the

bottom 25% of the observed values from the top 75%;
• second quartile, Q2, is the median, whichis the
number that divides the bottom 50% of the observed
values from the
top 50%;
• the third quartile, Q3, is the number that divides the
bottom75% of the observed values from the top 25%.
Variance, standard deviation, standart
error

/ s  s2

Standart error SE  s / n
 Questions
1.Biostatistics
2.Descriptive biostatistics
3.Analytical biostatistics (Inferential biostatistics)
4.Population
5.Sample
6.Sample representativeness
7.a variable
8.Quantitative (or numerical) variables
9.Qualitative (or categorical) variables
10.Discrete variables
11.Continuous variables
12.Nominal variables
13.Ordinal variables