Hotopf Matthew, Wessely Simon
King's Centre for Military Health Research (KCMHR), King's College London, Weston Education Centre, Cutcombe Road, London SE5 9RJ, UK.
Int J Epidemiol. 2005 Aug;34(4):791-800. doi: 10.1093/ije/dyi102. Epub 2005 May 23.
Despite over US $200 million having been spent researching illnesses following the 1990-91 Persian Gulf War, the nature and cause of such illnesses remains controversial. In this narrative review, we discuss some of the methodological issues that have affected epidemiological studies on this topic. These include low-response rates, ascertainment bias, recall bias, problems identifying suitable control groups, and problems defining the outcomes to study. From this we argue that difficulties have arisen partly owing to the significant delay between the point at which illnesses were first identified by veterans and the reporting of epidemiological studies and that health surveillance should be routine following future deployments.
尽管在1990 - 1991年海湾战争后已花费超过2亿美元用于研究相关疾病，但这些疾病的性质和病因仍存在争议。在这篇叙述性综述中，我们讨论了一些影响该主题流行病学研究的方法学问题。这些问题包括低应答率、确定偏倚、回忆偏倚、确定合适对照组的问题以及定义待研究结局的问题。由此我们认为，困难的出现部分是由于退伍军人首次发现疾病与流行病学研究报告之间存在显著延迟，并且未来部署后应进行常规健康监测。
