Medical Research Methods
Study Guide Questions
Course Introduction
Medical Research Methods introduces students to the fundamental principles and practices guiding scientific inquiry in healthcare and medicine. The course covers study design, data collection, ethical considerations, and statistical analysis. Students learn to critically evaluate medical literature, develop relevant research questions, formulate hypotheses, and interpret research findings. Topics include experimental and observational study types, sampling techniques, bias reduction, and the process of peer review. Emphasis is placed on evidence-based medicine and the practical application of research methods to improve patient care and advance medical knowledge.
Recommended Textbook
Gordis Epidemiology 6th Edition by Celentano ScD MHS
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19 Chapters
150 Verified Questions
150 Flashcards
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Page 2
Chapter 1: Introduction
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Sample Questions
Q1) Thanks to the contributions of Edward Jenner,the following disease was eradicated later by efforts organized by D.A.Henderson:
A) Cholera
B) Smallpox
C) Chickenpox
D) Polio
E) Zika
Answer: B
Q2) This historic character observed that childbed fever mortality was more common among women treated by physicians and medical students compared with women treated by midwives.Based on his observations,he implemented a hand wash policy that resulted in a decrease in mortality.Name the character that we are talking about.
A) John Snow
B) Edward Jenner
C) D.A. Henderson
D) Leon Gordis
E) Ignaz Semmelweis
Answer: E
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Chapter 2: The Dynamics of Disease Transmission
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Sample Questions
Q1) During the conquest of Mexico,outbreaks played an important role that favored the Spaniards.There were several outbreaks of smallpox that killed thousands of natives.Smallpox was introduced into America by the Europeans.Why were the natives particularly afflicted by smallpox outbreaks?
A) Among natives, the proportion of susceptibles was higher.
B) Among Spaniards, the proportion of immunes was extremely low.
C) Spaniards had the cure for smallpox.
D) Natives had a gene that made them more prone to die from smallpox.
E) Spaniards were protected from smallpox because they had armors.
Answer: A
Q2) What is the name of the occurrence of a clearly higher than expected number of cases of a disease within a limited geographical region?
A) Pandemic
B) Epidemic
C) Endemic
D) Zoonosis
E) Attack rate
Answer: B
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4
Chapter 3: The Occurrence of Disease: Idisease
Surveillance and Measures of Morbidity
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Sample Questions
Q1) An epidemiologist decides to investigate the incidence of diabetes in a population of 300 older adults who live in a nursing home.She visits the nursing home in January 1,2017 and later in December 31 of the same year.She looks into the records of these patients and learns that in her first visit,25 patients had diabetes and 35 in her second visit.What number should be in the numerator for her calculation of incidence?
A) 10
B) 25
C) 35
D) 300
E) 275
Answer: A
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5
Chapter 4: The Occurrence of Disease: II Mortality and Other Measures of Disease Impact
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Sample Questions
Q1) A researcher finds that the standardized mortality rate (SMR) for epidemiologists compared with the general population is 100.What does that mean?
A) The observed number of deaths for epidemiologists is the same as the expected.
B) Epidemiologists have a mortality rate 100 times greater than the general population.
C) Epidemiologists have a mortality rate 100 times lower than the general population.
D) The general population experience a mortality rate increased as compared with epidemiologists.
E) Nothing can be said with this information.
Q2) For a disease such as seasonal influenza,which is less fatal and of short duration?
A) Incidence rates and mortality rates will be similar.
B) Mortality rates will be much higher than incidence rates.
C) Incidence rates will be much higher than mortality rates.
D) Incidence rates will be unrelated to mortality rates.
E) None of the above.
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Chapter 5: Assessing the Validity and Reliability of Diagnostic and Screening Tests
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following statements about specificity is the most accurate?
A) The probability that a diseased person (case) in the population tested will be identified as diseased by the test.
B) The probability that a person without the disease (noncase) in the population tested will be identified as nondiseased by the test.
C) The probability that a person identified as diseased by the test will be a diseased person (case) in the population.
D) The probability that a person identified as nondiseased by the test will be a person without the disease (noncase) in the population.
E) The probability that a diseased person (case) in the population tested will be identified as nondiseased by the test.
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Chapter 6: The Natural History of Disease: Ways of Expressing Prognosis
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Q1) The following table describes the survival of patients treated from disease X from 2015 to 2017 followed for 3 years (assuming no loss to follow-up).If a person is treated and using all the information from the table,what is the probability of surviving 3 years after treatment? \(\begin{array}{r}
\text { Number alive at the end of year }\quad \\
\begin{array}{|l|l|l|l|l|}
\hline \text { Year of treatment } & \text { Number of patients treated } & \quad 1 \text { year } & \quad 2 \text { year } &\quad 3 \text { year } \\
\hline 2015 & 100 & 67 & 42 & 30 \\
\hline 2016 & 50 & 31 & 18 & \\
\hline 2017 & 75 & 52 & & \\
\hline \text { Totals } & 225 & 150 & 60 & 30 \\
\hline
\end{array}\end{array}\)
A) 0.29
B) 0.33
C) 0.61
D) 0.67
E) 0.71
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Chapter 7: Observational Studies
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Q1) Which of the following statements is not the accurate description of selection bias in case-control studies?
A) If cases are selected from a single hospital, any risk factors that are identified may be unique to that hospital.
B) If the hospital from which the cases are drawn is a tertiary care facility, any risk factors identified in the study may be risk factors only in persons with severe forms of the disease.
C) If hospitalized cases are to be used, it is desirable to select the cases from several hospitals in the community.
D) Using hospitalized patients as controls is the best way to characterize the reference population because they are a captive population and are clearly identified.
E) Best friends controls and neighborhood controls are examples of use of nonhospitalized people as controls.
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9
Chapter 8: Cohort Studies
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Sample Questions
Q1) In which of the following study designs is possible to calculate incidence rate?
A) Cross-sectional
B) Case-control
C) Cohort
D) Case-series
E) Report of a case
Q2) Which of the following statements is the most accurate characteristic of the nested case-control study?
A) A control who is selected early in the study could later develop the disease but cannot be a case in the same study.
B) In nested case-control studies, controls are a sample of individuals who are at risk for the disease at the time each case of disease develops.
C) Controls are randomly chosen from the defined cohort with which the study began.
D) The problems of possible recall bias from conventional case-control studies still remains.
E) Nested case-control studies are often less economical to conduct.
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10
Chapter 10: Assessing Preventive and Therapeutic
Measures: Randomized Trials
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Sample Questions
Q1) Two similar drugs (drug A and drug B) to alleviate back pain were released simultaneously.An investigator decides to test which of the drugs works better.He decides to conduct a trial in which randomly,half of the participants receive drug A for a month while the other half received drug B.After 2 weeks without any medication,participants switch the drug they were receiving (those who received A start taking B,and those who received B start taking A).What type of study design was illustrated in this example?
A) Cross-sectional study
B) Factorial randomized clinical trial
C) Crossover randomized clinical trial
D) Crossover cohort study
E) Phase II clinical trial
Q2) Participants in a clinical trial might report different symptoms when they know they are part of the intervention group instead of the control group.To avoid that,researchers use the following:
A) Confounding
B) Randomization
C) Concealment of random allocation
D) Masking
E) Effect modifiers
Page 11
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Chapter 11: Randomized Trials: Some Further Issues
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Sample Questions
Q1) What is the primary purpose of randomization?
A) To prevent bias in the assignment of treatment
B) To provide a probability basis for statistical testing
C) To ensure the same number of people are randomized to each group
D) To ensure that the subjects not to know which group they are assigned to
E) To guarantee the comparability of the different treatment groups
Q2) Epidemiologists decided to investigate the effect of sunscreens on sunburns.They ran an epidemiologic study to see the association of sunscreens and sunburns.Overall,460 people have enrolled in the study.Investigators randomly allocated 230 people to the treatment group (sunscreens) and 230 to the control group (placebo).They exposed those 460 people to the high mountain trail on a sunny day.At the end of the study,30 people developed sunburns in the sunscreen group and 130 people developed sunburns in the placebo group.What type of study design is this?
A) Cross-sectional study
B) Prospective cohort study
C) Case-control study
D) Randomized trial
E) Case-control study.
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Chapter 12: Estimating Risk: Is There an Association
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Sample Questions
Q1) The following table summarizes the findings of a cohort study.Participants were enrolled in January 1,2015,and followed up until December 31,2015.Researchers were interested in the effect of physical activity on cardiovascular disease. \[\begin{array} { |
l | c | c | c | }
\hline & \text { Cardiovascular events } & \text { No events } & \text { Total } \\
\hline \text { Physically active } & 28 & 1,972 & 2,000 \\
\hline \text { Inactive } & 75 & 2,925 & 3,000 \\
\hline
\end{array}\] Based on the previous information,calculate the relative risk of cardiovascular events for those who were physically active.
A) 0.38
B) 0.56
C) 1.50
D) 1.79
E) 2.68
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13
Chapter 13: More on Risk: Estimating the Potential for Prevention
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Sample Questions
Q1) The following is a measure of the strength of association,typically used in case-control studies to measure the association between exposure and disease:
A) Incidence rate
B) Population attributable fraction
C) Attributable fraction
D) Prevalence
E) Odds ratio
Q2) In a cohort study of smoking and myocardial infarction in City A,the number of myocardial infarctions were 250 cases among 7,000 smokers and the number of myocardial infarctions were 150 cases among 20,000 nonsmokers.What is the relative risk of smoking in this cohort study?
A) 0.5
B) 1.7
C) 3.5
D) 4.8
E) 7.5
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Chapter 14: From Association to Causation: Deriving
Inferences From Epidemiologic Studies
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Sample Questions
Q1) In a hypothetical cross-sectional study,marriage was found to be strongly associated with increased levels of happiness.Authors concluded that marriage was a cause of happiness.However,a reviewer of this study argued that because it is a cross-sectional study,it could not be determined whether marriage caused happiness or happiness caused marriage.What criterion of causal relationships was not met in the study according to the reviewer?
A) Strength of association
B) Biologic plausibility
C) Dose response
D) Temporal relationship
E) Replication of findings
Q2) Temporal relationship is a necessary criterion to establish causality.Which of the following epidemiologic study design allows to evaluate temporal relationship?
A) Cross-sectional
B) Case-control
C) Transversal
D) Cohort
E) Literature review
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Sample Questions
Q1) This table shows incidence rates (per 100,000) of groups exposed to neither risk factors or to one or two risk factors for lung cancer.What is the expected value of incidence rate X on asbestos exposure group among smokers in additive scale? Incidence Rates of Lung Cancer by Asbestos and Smoking Exposure Status \[\begin{array}{r}
\text { Smoking status }\quad\\ \text { Asbestos exposure } \begin{array} {|l|l|l|}
\hline& \text { Yes } \quad \quad& \text { No }\quad\quad \\
\hline \text { Yes (regular exercise) } & 2.0 & 2.6 \\
\hline \text { No (no exercise) } & 4.0 & x\\
\hline
\end{array}\end{array}\]
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Page 16
Chapter 16: Identifying the Roles of Genetic and Environmental
Factors in Disease Causation
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Sample Questions
Q1) A total of 1,500 pairs of adult twins,600 monozygotic and 900 dizygotic,were studied to estimate the concordance for a childhood cancer.In the 600 monozygotic twins,40 of the pairs were concordant for the disease,60 of the pairs were discordant for the disease,and neither twin had the disease in the remaining 500 pairs.In the 900 dizygotic twins,30 of the pairs were concordant for the disease,120 of the pairs were discordant for the disease,and neither twin had the disease in the remaining 750 pairs.What is the concordant rate,in monozygotic twins,of the disease in twin pairs with at least one affected member?
A) 0.1
B) 0.4
C) 0.6
D) 0.7
E) 1.5
Q2) The following suggests environmental factors causing a disease:
A) Monozygotic twins getting the same disease
B) Family history of disease
C) Early development
D) A rapid change in the trends of disease over time
E) Biologic brothers adopted by different families getting the same disease
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Chapter 17: Using Epidemiology to Evaluate Health Services
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Sample Questions
Q1) When testing whether we can achieve a less expensive and better way to treat a disease with an intervention that has shown to work previously,we are looking for A) efficacy.
B) effectiveness.
C) efficiency.
D) power.
E) feasibility.
Q2) Which of the following statements is the most accurate definition of efficiency?
A) A measure of a specific intervention, procedure, regimen, or service produces a beneficial result under ideal conditions.
B) The process of testing a vaccine in a community where some of individuals do not want to be vaccinated.
C) The process of testing a new drug in a community where individuals have various compliances of drug intake.
D) The process of estimating the best effort of intervention or procedure.
E) The effects or end results achieved in relation to the effort expended in terms of money, resources, and time.
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18
Chapter 18: Epidemiologic Approach to Evaluating Screening Programs
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Q1) The usual time to death after diagnosis of disease X is 2 years.A screening program allows for the early detection of disease X,on average 1 year earlier than the usual diagnosis; however,there is no available treatment even in early stages of disease X.With the screening program it seems like the time to death has increased to 3 years; however,this is only due to the early diagnosis thanks to the screening program.What is the name of the issue previously described?
A) Timing bias
B) Survival bias
C) Selection bias
D) Confounding
E) Lead-time bias
Q2) Which of the following statements is the most accurate example of tertiary prevention?
A) Receiving a yellow fever vaccination at a tertiary hospital
B) Using a mosquito net while visiting a malaria-endemic country
C) Taking preventative malaria drug before getting an infection
D) Receiving regular blood smear test to detect the malaria early
E) Joining malaria rehabilitation programs to reduce or eliminate long-term impairments and disabilities from previous infections
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Chapter 19: Epidemiology and Public Policy
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Sample Questions
Q1) What is the name of the chart that is typically used to depict the results of a meta-analysis?
A) Forest plot
B) Pie chart
C) Box plot
D) Manhattan plot
E) Bar chart
Q2) Which of the following statements is not an accurate description of epidemiology in health policy?
A) A major role of epidemiology is a basis for developing policies that may affect human health.
B) One of the roles of epidemiology in public health policy is for risk assessment.
C) Some researchers use systematic review or meta-analysis to synthesize the literature regarding a specific health topic.
D) Epidemiology is the only relevant scientific discipline in the process of risk assessment.
E) Journals that may not want to publish the studies report no association will increase the publication bias.
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Page 20
Chapter 20: Ethical and Professional Issues in Epidemiology
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Q1) To abide with the ethical principle of autonomy,epidemiologic research requires A) epidemiologists to provide financial incentives.
B) to obtain participant's consent before collecting any information.
C) to investigate only participants who are in excellent health.
D) share participant's information with any institution.
E) that only one researcher is able to access the data collected.
Q2) A challenge in epidemiologic research that explores the effect of race on cardiovascular disease is that
A) measuring race is hard because is a poorly understood concept and its validity is questionable.
B) measuring race requires DNA testing.
C) there are too many human races.
D) race is usually not associated with health outcomes.
E) cardiovascular disease is not well defined.
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