Balkau B, Eschwege E
INSERM U21, Hôpital Paul Brousse, Villejuif, France.
Diabete Metab. 1995 Jun;21(3):225-31.
This is the second a series of three articles which reviews the identification of risk factors of a disease, here: diabetes or complications of diabetes. In the first of the series [1], we gave the definition of a risk factor, along with measures of its force-relative risk and odds ratio, followed by the epidemiological definitions of the diseases: diabetes, coronary heart disease and hypertension. Risk factors were further discussed and we completed the discussion by some observations on the bias which can arise from a study or from its analysis, which can lead the researcher to the wrong conclusion. In this second article we define the three types of epidemiological studies which are used to determine whether factors are associated with a disease: observational or cross-sectional studies, cohort studies and casecohort studies. Examples are provided of each of these study types; their advantages and disadvantages are discussed. The final paper will provide some examples of the identification of risk factors from the literature. The first example involves diabetes and pancreatic cancer, the second birth weight and non-insulin dependent diabetes. Having found an association between a risk factor and diabetes, we will discuss whether it can be considered to be a risk factor, and if so whether it is likely to be a cause of the disease.
这是三篇系列文章中的第二篇，该系列文章回顾了一种疾病（此处为糖尿病或糖尿病并发症）风险因素的识别。在系列文章的第一篇[1]中，我们给出了风险因素的定义，以及其强度指标——相对风险和比值比，随后介绍了这些疾病的流行病学定义：糖尿病、冠心病和高血压。我们进一步讨论了风险因素，并通过对研究或其分析中可能出现的偏差的一些观察来完成讨论，这些偏差可能会导致研究人员得出错误的结论。在第二篇文章中，我们定义了用于确定因素是否与疾病相关的三种流行病学研究类型：观察性或横断面研究、队列研究和病例队列研究。文中给出了每种研究类型的示例，并讨论了它们的优缺点。最后一篇文章将提供一些文献中风险因素识别的示例。第一个例子涉及糖尿病和胰腺癌，第二个例子涉及出生体重与非胰岛素依赖型糖尿病。在发现风险因素与糖尿病之间存在关联后，我们将讨论它是否可被视为风险因素，如果是，它是否可能是该疾病的病因。
