• Question: Mark what is an epidoimology

    Asked by Tom Oscar Archie to Claire, Franco, Koi, Linda, Mark on 13 Jun 2016.
    • Photo: Franco Falcone

      Franco Falcone answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      I’ll leave that to Mark – he is the epidemiologist!

    • Photo: Mark Booth

      Mark Booth answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      Tom – an epidemiologist is someone who is interested in understanding how populations are affected by diseases. Typically this means working with whole communities, or carefully selected parts of a community, and undertaking surveys to uncover risk factors for diseases that may be affecting a few or many people in that community. For example, I have worked in communities in Africa where it has been recorded by doctors that some people are affected by schistosomiasis. My job as an epidemiologist in this situation is find out how many people are affected, why they are affected and what happens to them after they have been treated.

    • Photo: Linda Anagu

      Linda Anagu answered on 13 Jun 2016:

      Mark have explicitly answered your question. Well done Mark.

    • Photo: Claire Bourke

      Claire Bourke answered on 14 Jun 2016:

      That’s a great answer from mark!

      One way to combine studies of the immune system with epidemiology is through ‘inmunoepideniology’. This is where patterns of immune responses can be measured in communities, like the ones that mark works with. This is an important addition to epidemiology since immune responses, particularly ineffective immune responses, can be risk factors for disease. As an inmunoepideniologist I have measured immune factors in blood samples collected from adults and children infected by schistosome worms in Zimbabwe and investigated how these responses relate to their infection levels, age, where they live, how often they use different water sources where infections can occur and whether or not they have been treated to clear infection before.

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