Applying quantitative bias analysis to epidemiologic data (Q1012712)

This book provides the first-ever compilation of bias analysis methods for use with epidemiologic data. It guides the reader through the planning stages of bias analysis, including the design of validation studies and the collection of validity data from other sources. Three chapters present methods for corrections to address selection bias, uncontrolled confouding, and classification errors. Subsequent chapters extend these methods to multidimensional bias analysis, probabilistic bias analysis, and multiple bias analysis. The text concludes with a chapter on presentation and interpretation of bias analysis results. Although techniques for bias analysis have been available for decades, these methods are considered difficult to implement. This book not only gathers the methods in a cohesive and organized presentation, but also explains the methods in a consistent fashion and provides customizable spreadsheets to implement the solutins. By downloading the spreadsheets, the readers can follow the examples in the text and then modify the spreadsheets to complete their own bias analyses. Readers without experience using quantitative bias analysis will be able to design, implement, and understand the analyses that address the major endangerings of the validity of epidemiological research. More experienced analysts will appreciate the compilation of the bias analysis methods and like to software tools that facilitate their projects. The authors have organized and presented many day-long workshops on the methods of quantitative bias analysis. In addition, they have collaborated on many papers that developed methods of quantitative bias analysis or used the methods in the data analysis.