Environmental Health: Epidemiological Study on Respiratory Diseases in Lower Manhattan

This article discusses a retrospective cohort study conducted to determine the presence of acute and chronic respiratory disease among the residents of lower Manhattan. The study design, biases involved, and conclusions drawn from the study are explored. The researchers found that people in the affected area were more affected by respiratory issues than others due to differences in socio-economic status. The study had selection, reporting, and misclassification biases.

Running head: ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH
ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

1ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH
Answer 1
A.
The type of epidemiological study that was chosen for the research article was the
retrospective cohort study (Kwan et al., 2012).
B.
There are several reasons due to which, section of cohort study was appropriate for the
study.
 The primary aim of the study was to determine the presence of acute and chronic
respiratory disease among the residents of lower Manhattan. Therefore usage of
cohort health study allowed the researchers to conduct such comparisons among
different places and for multiple health outcomes (Lin et al., 2005).
 As the study was conducted over entire New York, to assemble and include such
huge population, cohort study was appropriate.
 As the study compared the huge population with or without breathing issues, the
chances of bias were maximum, hence, cohort study helped to lower the present
bias (Lin et al., 2005).
Answer 2
The type of bias that were involved in the study are:
 As the research had lower response rate due to an emotional aspect, the research
has selection bias.

2ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH
 As there is a chance that participants reported more than one symptoms at the
time of reporting, the research also had reporting bias.
 The third bias could be of misclassification bias in which some unidentified group
took part in the study that affected the study results (Lin et al., 2005).
Answer 3
A.
The researchers found that people of affected area and control area varied due to the
differences in socio-economic status, household income, educational level, level of multicultural
community. Further they also related the presence of asthma with that of the low Socio-
economic status. Hence, they concluded that people in the affected area were more affected to
respiratory issues than others (Lin et al., 2005).
B.
To design this cohort research study, the researchers decided two areas to conduct the
survey and then sent 9168 surveys to the affected area whereas, 962 packets of survey in
controlled area. Therefore, this study was helped to compare the data collected from both the
areas and determine the health status of affected areas to that of the control area. This was the
study and the study design which was used to address the explanation (Lin et al., 2005).

3ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH
References
Kwan, M. Y., Cairney, J., Faulkner, G. E., & Pullenayegum, E. E. (2012). Physical activity and
other health-risk behaviors during the transition into early adulthood: a longitudinal
cohort study. American journal of preventive medicine, 42(1), 14-20.
Lin, S., Reibman, J., Bowers, J. A., Hwang, S. A., Hoerning, A., Gomez, M. I., & Fitzgerald, E.
F. (2005). Upper respiratory symptoms and other health effects among residents living
near the World Trade Center site after September 11, 2001. American journal of
epidemiology, 162(6), 499-507.