Course announcement: Diagnostic Test Evaluation

(on behalf of Britt Bang Jensen)

NOVA PhD course of 3 ECTS, organised by Eystein Skjerve, Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU)

Dates and location: 27 June - 1 July 2016 in Sandnes, Norway.

Course Description
The course covers the epidemiological aspects of diagnostic test evaluation (DTE) studies – from the technical aspects of planning, conducting and subsequently analyzing data from such studies, to the underlying assumptions regarding disease definitions, test characteristics and the implications of using a perfect reference tests vs. a latent class approach.

Course website
https://www.nmbu.no/en/students/nova/students/phd-courses/phd-2016/node/26715

Course announcement: Epidemiology of food hygiene, Helsinki, Finland, 23 May 2016

On behalf of: Maria J Vilar,
Doctoral Program in Food Chain and Health

Venue: Seminar room 11-12, EE Building (2nd floor), Viikki Campus, University of Helsinki, Agnes Sjöbergin katu 2, Helsinki.

Course organizers: Dr Maria J. Vilar and Prof. Hannu Korkeala, Department of Food Hygiene and Environmental Health, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, University of Helsinki.

Description of the course content:
The course is designed to provide a comprehensive introduction to the basic concepts on the epidemiology of foodborne pathogens: Risk Analysis, Quantitative Risk Assessment, Outbreak studies. All the topics will consist in conceptual and practical aspects. The students will be expected to study some background scientific articles. Reading papers and practical guide will be provided before the course.

Course program and further information.

NOSOVE course 2016, 18-20 July in Turku, Finland

NOSOVE organizes an international course 
to veterinarians, epidemiologists,

medical doctors, biologists, media representatives, 
and others interested in the topics.

Time: Monday 18.07.2016 – Wednesday 20.07.2016

Venue: Koulu, Eerikinkatu 18, Turku, Finland

http://www.visitturku.fi

Participation fee:

250 € for the whole course, including lunches, coffees, course dinner, and diploma.

Or 80 € for Monday only, including lunch, afternoon coffee, and diploma.

Language of the course: English.

Preparations for the course: Voluntary pre-reading will be suggested, bringing a laptop is useful.

Deadline for registration: 15.05.2016.

Register by sending an email to brian.lassen@gmail.com with the following information:

First name

Last name

Email-address

Phone number

Affiliation

Special dietary requests

Do you register for the whole course or for Monday only

Anything else you wish to tell the organizers

The course is organized if the minimum number of participants is exceeded. The number of participants is limited, and priority is given to those attending the whole course and those registering early.

The registrations will be confirmed by 20.05.2016, with instructions regarding paying the participation fee. The deadline of the payments will be 15.06.2016.

Teachers: 

Arvo Viltrop

Prof.

Estonia

Ruska Rimhanen-Finne

DVM, PhD, Adjunct prof.

Finland

Viktor Zöldi

MSc, PhD

Hungary

Francesca Latronico

DVM

Italy

Pikka Jokelainen

DVM, PhD

Finland

Brian Lassen

MSc, PhD

Denmark

NOSOVE course 2016, Turku, Finland

Monday 18.07.2016

11:45 – 12:00                          Gathering at the venue (PJ)

Lunch                                     

13:00 – 14:30                          Welcome to the course (PJ)

African swine fever in the Baltic area – update, epidemiology and lessons learnt, from the Estonian perspective (AV)

Coffee

15:00 – 17:00                          African swine fever, continued

Tuesday 19.07.2016

08:30 – 10:00                         Zoonosis surveillance and outbreak investigations at the National Institute for Health and Welfare, Finland (RRH)

Coffee

10:30 – 12:00                          Parasitic outbreaks in Finland (VZ)                           Surveillance of human parasitic infections                 in Finland (FL) 

Lunch

13:00 – 14:30                          Case-study on trichinellosis (VZ, FL, RRH)

Coffee

15:00 – 17:00                          Case-study continued

19:00 –                                    Course dinner

Wednesday 20.07.2016

08:30 – 10:00                         Foodborne zoonotic parasites – parasites from the environment (BL) and tissues (PJ), with emphasis on One Health epidemiology

Coffee

10:30 – 12:00                         Workshop on the officials-media-research balance of zoonotic parasites, using a multicriteria ranking approach (PJ, BL)

Lunch

13:00 – 14:30                         Workshop continues

Wrap-up and take-home-messages

Coffee

14:45 – 17:00                          NOSOVE General Assembly Meeting                       followed by NOSOVE Board Meeting

First announcement of 2016 NOSOVE course - save the date

Interested in epidemiology, outbreaks, zoonoses, parasites?

Save the date

The next NOSOVE course will take place

18.-20. July 2016

(right before EMOP XII)

in Turku, Finland

The Nordic Society for Veterinary Epidemiology (NOSOVE) is an informal organization

with the vision of advancing veterinary epidemiology.

http://nosove.blogspot.fi/

https://www.facebook.com/TheNOSOVE/

Course announcement: Learn the fundamentals of R PROGRAMMING, DATA ANALYSIS, AND DATA APP DEVELOPMENT

Learn the fundamentals of R PROGRAMMING, DATA ANALYSIS, AND DATA APP DEVELOPMENT starting June 22.

Gain hands-on experience in one of the world’s fastest-growing fields, with a comprehensive course sequence from Johns Hopkins University and a hands-on project from leading keyboard app developer SwiftKey.

VIEW SPECIALIZATION

The Data Science Specialization takes you from novice to expert in only nine short courses. When you complete the full sequence, including a Capstone Project created with leading smartphone keyboard app developer SwiftKey, you’ll have the tools you need to draw powerful insights from any complex dataset. You’ll learn to:

Work with common data science tools, including GitHub, R packages, and RStudio Create organized datasets, graphics, and summaries Draw conclusions from data using a variety of inferential methods Develop simple machine learning algorithms and user-facing data applications

Hear more from the Specialization professors Brian Caffo, PhD  Jeff Leek, PhD Roger D. Peng, PhD

The first of nine four-week courses starts June 22.

ENROLL TODAY

Learner Outcome

“I never thought about making a switch into Data Science. I enjoyed many years as a teacher, but I wanted a new intellectual challenge in a cutting-edge field that combined my passions for mathematics and technology. Data science was an ideal fit, but it seemed daunting—I didn't know where to begin. Additionally, the time and cost seemed beyond my reach. When I heard about JHU's Data Science Specialization, it seemed ideal for what I wanted to learn and at my pace of life and I enrolled immediately. After completing the courses and the Capstone Project, a recruiter found my profile via LinkedIn which had my portfolio of work on GitHub I developed through the Specialization. Throughout the interview process, I referred to the projects and problems I worked on in the Specialization. I’m now employed at one of the leading insurance and financial services companies in the world.” - LUCAS A., USA, Data Scientist

Download the Apps

Course announcement: 13th Crane Seminar: "Risk assessment in health and welfare – who, when, why, and how?"

(Forwarded from announcement by Stefan Gunnarsson and Jan Hultgren)

Seminar and postgraduate course (3 ECTS)
13th Crane Seminar:
Risk assessment in health and welfare – who, when, why, and how?
Skara, Sweden, 23–27 March 2015

Visit http://www.slu.se/craneseminar for further information.
Welcome to register at the latest 23 February 2015!

Best wishes,
Stefan Gunnarsson and Jan Hultgren

Only 15 days left for the early registration of the course in Social Network Analysis

Only 15 days left for the early registration to the course in Social Network Analysis.

Please have a look at the course description and share with your colleagues.

The course will be held in Tallinn, Estonia September 24-26th 2014.
More information about the course here.

STATISTICAL PRACTICE IN EPIDEMIOLOGY USING R

Tartu, Estonia, Friday 30 May to Wednesday 4 June 2014

(See also the attached flyer)

The course is intended for epidemiologists and statisticians who wish to use R (www.r-project.org<http://www.r-project.org>) for statistical modelling and analysis of epidemiological data. The aim of the course is to give participants access to a set of tools in current use by statisticians in epidemiology. The course requires fairly good understanding of statistical principles and some familiarity with epidemiological concepts and study types.

The course will be mainly practically oriented with more than half the time at the computer.

Contents:
* History of R. Language. Objects. Functions.
* Interface to other data formats. Data frames.
* Tabulation of data.
* Logistic regression for case-control-studies.
* Poisson regression for follow-up studies.
* Causal inference.
* Parametrization of models.
* Graphics in R.
* Graphical reporting of results.
* Time-splitting &  Standardized Mortality Ratios.
* Survival analysis and competing risks.
* Multi-state models.
* Nested and matched case-control studies.
* Case-cohort studies.

Venue:
Department of Mathematical Statistics
University of Tartu
J. Liivi 2,
EE - 50409 Tartu
Estonia

Price: 550 EUR for academic participants, 800 EUR for non-academic participants
- Includes tuition, course material, lunches, coffee breaks and social events (welcome cocktail and course dinner).
- Excludes travels, accommodation, and other meals

The course is a self-supporting entity, and there are NO grants or stipends available for travel or participation.

Registration: Send an e-mail which briefly states your qualifications in epidemiology and statistics to the organizers
* Bendix Carstensen: BxC@steno.dk<mailto:BxC@steno.dk>
* Esa Läärä: Esa.Laara@oulu.fi<mailto:Esa.Laara@oulu.fi>
* Krista Fischer: Krista.Fischer@ut.ee<mailto:Krista.Fischer@ut.ee>

Deadline for application: 1st April 2014.
Further information to applicants will be given by e-mail shortly after the deadline.

Course homepage: http://BendixCarstensen.com/SPE

Network Analysis Workshop and NOSOVE General Assembly

Update 14.07.2014
Sadly we have had to cancel the course due to lack of registered participants. We hope it will be possible to organize the course at a later date.

Time:
September 24th -26th, 2014

Venue: 

Hotel L’Ermitage

Toompuiestee 19, 10137 Tallinn, Estonia 

Website: www.lermitagehotel.ee/en/

Instructor: 

Rob Christley

Reader in Epidemiology

Department of Epidemiology & Population Health

Institute of Infection & Global Health, and 

School of Veterinary Science

University of Liverpool,

UK

Provisional Outline

The course will introduce the terminology, methods and some of the software available to analyse networks. The workshop will be a combination of short lectures, discussions and hands-on analysis (half of each day will be spent completing exercises designed to give participants practical experience of network analysis). By the end of the workshop participants will be able to design and undertake studies appropriate for the collection of network data, and use such data to create network images, describe important features of the network and identify important individuals and subgroups within the network. In addition, we will cover aspects of the statistical analysis of network data and the impact of networks on infectious disease dynamics.

Data will be provided for the practical sessions; however, participants will be encouraged to bring their own data to work on during the workshop. In addition, participants are encouraged to discuss their ideas for network analysis with the group.

The course outline below provides the basic course structure and topics to be covered. This may be subject to some modification.

Requirements:

• Course material with notes, practicals and solutions to the exercises will be provided during the first session of the workshop.

• Participants will be required to bring their own laptop.

• Software required: UCINET. A free trial version will be provided for the course.

Costs for participation:

Participation in the whole programme: 300 EUR (includes teaching all days, teaching material, workshop, AGM, all lunches, dinners and coffe breaks) 

Accommodation:

Hotel L’Ermitage; Toompuiestee 19, 10137 Tallinn, Estonia  www: www.lermitagehotel.ee/en/

Rooms have been booked for participant in the NOSOVE workshop/course 

Per night in a single room: 60 EUR including breakfast

Per night in an advanced single room: 72 EUR including breakfast

Per night in a twin or double room: 60 EUR including breakfast for two (30 EUR per person) 

Detailed program and Registration: 

Please click this link

Deadline for registration: 30th of May 2014

NOVA Postgraduate course in Advanced Veterinary Epidemiology - Data Quality

New NOVA course in veterinary epidemiology focusing on data quality.
Tallinn, Estonia September 17-23, 2014

Please note that this course is running just before the NOSOVE course, and also in Tallinn! This is an excellent opportunity to get two courses in one run. Do not miss out!

More information about the NOVA course:
Course information and application
NOVA course website

13th Crane Seminar: Risk assessment – improving public health and animal welfare in food production

[Information copied from the course website, please visit for additional information]

Seminar and postgraduate course (3 ECTS)

Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Skara, Sweden, 31 March - 4 April 2014


Risk assessment is used increasingly as a science-based method to describe and quantify risks in human and animal populations, and to identify important determinants of such risks. This seminar addresses the application of risk assessment concepts and methods to improve public health and animal welfare in food production. The seminar includes 5 days on campus in Skara, Sweden.

The Crane Seminar is both a seminar open to anyone, and a postgraduate course (3 ECTS credits) for students on a PhD or residency programme in medicine, veterinary medicine, animal science, or biology. In case of a large number of applicants, PhD students will be given priority on a first-come, first-served basis.

Crane Seminars are recurrent interdisciplinary events organised by the Department of Animal Environment and Health every 2nd-3rd year to connect human and animal sciences under current themes of high societal relevance. Needless to say, the seminar includes an excursion to Lake Hornborga, host of thousands of Cranes at this time of the year.

Welcome to Crane Country in March!

Future NOSOVE course - Social Network Analysis

The conclusion of local preferences of the future NOSOVE course in Estonia is that the course will be on Social Network Analysis.

The course will be in the summer of 2014. More information will follow on the blog.

Master level course in Disease Control and Dynamics - in a One Health setting 2013 at University of Copenhagen

Dear colleagues,

we offer a course in Disease Control and Dynamics - in a One Health setting at master level at Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen starting August 19, 2013.

The course consists of three parts
Part 1 is a distance learning part that takes place between August 19th and 23rd. It mainly involves reading up on principles and concepts of diagnostic test evaluation and prevalence estimation and finalizes with an online test.

Part 2 takes place at Frederiksberg Campus, Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences as a 5 day period from August 26th to 30th 2013. It is planned as a series of lectures with interspersed group and individual exercises and assignments. Relevant literature will be supplied or suggested before and during the course.

Part 3 is conducted electronically during a 5 week long period from September 2nd to October 10th 2013 as distance learning. Activities that will be assessed include weekly short assignments, participation in discussion forums and a final 24 hour examination. The time needed to participate in this part of the course is estimated at 2 hours per day, on average.

During the course we will be working with basic methods to map and investigate spatiotemporal patterns of disease and model dynamics of infections in human and animal populations.

Find a pdf-flyer with a full description of the course by clicking this link.

If you have any questions do not hesitate to contact me:
Liza Rosenbaum Nielsen
Course coordinator
liza@sund.ku.dk

Syndromic Surveillance – monitoring animal health data to detect temporal aberrations in near real-time using free software

 [Proposal for next NOSOVE course in June 2014, please vote in the poll] 

Teacher: Dorea Fernanda

Syndromic surveillance can be characterised as a process involving the continuous analysis of health data to provide immediate feedback.

The increasing amount of health data recording in electronic format presents extra challenges for data analysis, but also new opportunities to extract information from data in real and near-real time. In this course participants will have a chance to learn, through several hands-on exercises, how to use freely available software to set up automated, autonomous routines of data analysis.

The theory and exercises will cover all the basic steps to successfully develop, evaluate and implement a syndromic surveillance system capable of detecting temporal aberrations (which may indicate the occurrence of outbreaks) when monitoring cases load from a given animal health data source, such as laboratory submissions, clinical cases, etc. These steps can be summarized as:

• basic text mining methods for automated classification of records into syndromes;
• retrospective evaluation of data to create baseline profiles following the removal of excessive noise and aberrations, and the identification of temporal effects;
• prospective evaluation of detection algorithms; and finally
• real-time monitoring and implementation.

As all software used are freely available, participants will be able to readily apply the skills learned into their work or research.

Course specifications

Participants are expected to have a basic knowledge of biostatistics. No previous knowledge of the software to be used is expected.

The course exercises will use the statistical programming environment R, and  RapidMiner, the world-leading open-source system for data mining available freely from Rapid-I (http://rapid-i.com/content/view/26/84/). Participants will receive download and installation instructions upon registration, and they should bring their own laptop computer. Datasets will be provided as part of the course, but participants are welcome to bring a dataset of their own to explore some of the techniques learned.

Workshop Content

Day 1 – Introduction to the tools:  Basics of using R and Rapid Miner.

Day2 – Syndromic surveillance, Step 1: Automated classification of records into syndromes. Participants will learn the basics of text-mining and will practice implementing supervised (rule-based) and unsupervised (naïve Bayes, Decision Trees) machine learning methods in order to create automated routines to classify records into syndromes.

Day3 – Syndromic surveillance, Step 2: Retrospective evaluation of data available. Basic concepts of time series analysis will be covered. Participants will practice on a dataset in order to learn how to identify statistical characteristics of the time series which can impact aberration detection, in special temporal effects such as day of week and seasonal patterns. Step 3: Prospective evaluation of data. Participants will practice the use of basic temporal aberration detection algorithms, such as control charts (cumulative sums, Shewhart type control charts and Exponentially Weighted Moving Average). More advanced methods (such as Holt-Winters exponential smoothing and removal of temporal effects using regression models) will then be employed to deal with specific characteristics that can be found when monitoring different data sources.

Day4 – Syndromic surveillance, Step 4: Implementation. Participants will learn how to combine tools (Rapid Miner and R) in order to implement a syndromic surveillance system, from data acquisition to final reports.

 

Network Analysis Workshop

 [Proposal for next NOSOVE course in June 2014, please vote in the poll] 

Rob Christley

Senior Lecturer in Epidemiology

Head of Epidemiology & Public Health

School of Veterinary Science

University of Liverpool,

UK

Provisional Outline

The course will introduce the terminology, methods and some of the software available to analyse networks. The workshop will be a combination of short lectures, discussions and hands-on analysis (half of each day will be spent completing exercises designed to give participants practical experience of network analysis). By the end of the workshop participants will be able to design and undertake studies appropriate for the collection of network data, and use such data to create network images, describe important features of the network and identify important individuals and subgroups within the network. In addition, we will cover aspects of the statistical analysis of network data and the impact of networks on infectious disease dynamics..

Data will be provided for the practical sessions; however, participants will be encouraged to bring their own data to work on during the workshop. In addition, participants are encouraged to discuss their ideas for network analysis with the group.

The course outline below provides the basic course structure and topics to be covered. This may be subject to some modification.

DAY 1

a.m.	Theory	INTRODUCTION Overview of the course What is network analysis? -   What is a network? -   The network paradigm -   History Applications of network analysis -   Veterinary -   Other applications Network topology; types and properties of networks Books, references, and other useful information!
p.m.	Practical	FROM DATA TO ILLUSTRATION Introduction to data sets Introduction to the software Data entry Viewing and editing data Data manipulation Importing attribute data Visualising a network Saving NetDraw files

DAY 2

a.m.	Theory	FROM ILLUSTRATION TO ANALYSIS §   Analysis of individual nodes -    Centrality §   Analysis of a network -    Cohesion §   Analysis of groups and regions -    Components, cohesive sub-groups -    Structural & regular equivalence, blockmodelling
p.m.	Practical	FROM ILLUSTRATION TO ANALYSIS §   Analysis of individual nodes §   Analysis of networks §   Analysis of sub-groups

DAY 3

a.m.	Theory	FURTHER TOPICS IN NETWORK ANALYSIS §   Network data collection §   Networks and disease dynamics §   Discussion session -    Presentation of research ideas or data by the participants (if they choose)
p.m.	Practical	FURTHER TOPICS IN NETWORK ANALYSIS §   Brief overview of other network software §   Statistical analysis of network data §   Continue working on exercises from day 1 and 2 §   Work on your own data

Requirements:

·      Course material with notes, practicals and solutions to the exercises will be provided during the first session of the workshop.

·      Participants will be required to bring their own laptop.

·      Software required: UCINET. A free trial version will be provided for the course.