Epidemiology
Epidemiology is the study of factors affecting the health
and illness of populations, and serves as the foundation
and logic of interventions made in the interest of public
health and preventive medicine. It is considered a
cornerstone methodology of public health research, and
is highly regarded in evidence-based medicine for
identifying risk factors for disease and determining op-
timal treatment approaches to clinical practice. In the
study of communicable and non-communicable diseases,
the work of epidemiologists ranges from outbreak in-
vestigation to study design, data collection and analysis
including the development of statistical models to test
hypotheses and the documentation of results for sub-
mission to peer-reviewed journals. Epidemiologists rely
on a number of other scientific disciplines, such as bio-
logy (to better understand disease processes), Geograph-
ic Information Science (to store data and map disease
patterns) and social science disciplines including philo-
sophy (to better understand proximate and distal risk
factors).
Etymology
Epidemiology, "the study of what is upon the people," is
derived from the Greek terms epi = upon, among; demos =
people, district; logos = study, word, discourse; suggest-
ing that it applies only to human populations. But the
term is widely used in studies of zoological populations
(veterinary
epidemiology),
although
the
term
’epizoology’ is available, and it has also been applied to
studies of plant populations (botanical epidemiology).[1]
History
The Greek physician Hippocrates is sometimes said to be
the uncle of epidemiology. He is the first person known
to have examined the relationships between the occur-
rence of disease and environmental influences. He
coined the terms endemic (for diseases usually found in
some places but not in others) and epidemic (for disease
that are seen at some times but not others).[2]
One of the earliest theories on the origin of disease
was that it was primarily the fault of human luxury. This
was expressed by phi