Principles of Biostatistics for

Medicine

Educational Objective Students should be able to explain what biostatistics is,

and the role it plays in medicine. Students should be able to explain the relationships

between biostatistics, epidemiology, and evidence-based medicine.

Students should be able to explain how statistical tools are used to describe patients, or to provide credible evidence for the physician’s use when making Diagnosis (Dx), Therapy (Tx), or Prognosis (Px) decisions and recommendations to patients.

What is Biostatistics?“Biostatistics is the application of statistical methods to

medical and biological phenomenon” (Murad & Shi, 2010, p 3)

Biostatistics is a tool that is used to analyze, understand, and explain the variance in medical and epidemiological data (Jekel et al., 2007). Descriptive statistics are tools which provide information that

describes the patient, often in terms of demographic characteristics or disease status.

Inferential statistics are tools which allow the analysis and interpretation of a sample of data that represents a given population.

Biostatistics is a Foundational Tool

Epidemiology (the study of disease) is the foundation of evidence for Evidence-Based Medicine (EBM).

Biostatistics is the tool that is used to analyze and understand epidemiological data.

Epidemiology (POD) Evidence-Based Medicine (CDM)

Biostatistics

Common Epidemiological Data

A proportion is a type of fraction in which the numerator is a subset of the denominator.

A rate is a fraction that also contains a time component.

A ratio expresses the relationship between two numeric quantities.