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Natural history of diseases: Statistical designs and issues
Author(s) -
Jewell Nicholas P.
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
clinical pharmacology and therapeutics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.941
H-Index - 188
eISSN - 1532-6535
pISSN - 0009-9236
DOI - 10.1002/cpt.423
Subject(s) - natural history , disease , identification (biology) , natural (archaeology) , data science , epidemiology , clinical study design , clinical trial , computer science , drug development , management science , intensive care medicine , risk analysis (engineering) , medicine , bioinformatics , biology , drug , pathology , engineering , ecology , pharmacology , paleontology
Understanding the natural history of a disease is an important prerequisite for designing studies that assess the impact of interventions, both chemotherapeutic and environmental, on the initiation and expression of the condition. Identification of biomarkers that mark disease progression may provide important indicators for drug targets and surrogate outcomes for clinical trials. However, collecting and visualizing data on natural history is challenging, in part, because disease processes are complex and evolve in different chronological periods for different subjects. Various epidemiological designs are used to elucidate components of the natural history process. We briefly discuss statistical issues, limitations, and challenges associated with various epidemiological designs.