Biostatistics Analysis

Statistics applied to biological problems is called biostatisics or sometimes biometry, meaning biological measurement.

History

According to Jerrold H. Zar in Biostatistical Analysis 2010, the first courses in what is now called biostatistics were probably taught by Charles B. Davenport at Harvard from 1887 to 1889. His Statistical Methods in Biological Variation (1899) may have been the first American book focused on biostatistics.

Significance

Biostatistics is important in the fields of public health, epidemiology, genetics and medicine. Biostatisticians help put together research studies by figuring out many subjects needed to study to get the correct power wanted for analysis. They help with analyzing the studies as they go along to get preliminary answers. They help with the final analysis of research studies to get them published.

Benefits

Biostatisticians work in tandem with scientists in their fields to use the knowledge of both practices to their mutual advantage. Biostatisticians work with medical doctors at the Oregon Health Sciences University Cancer Institute.

Techniques

According to Statistics in a Nutshell, many of the statistics used in medicine and epidemiology are common to other fields. Examples are t-tests, correlation, regression and ANOVA. Other statistics such as odds ratio were developed specifically to meet the needs of medical and epidemiological research.

Software Used

Most biostatisticians work with one or more standard statistical packages. SAS and SPSS are the most common and robust software packages used. R is a free statistics software.

References

• Jerrold H. Zar; Biostatisical Analysis; 2010
• Staitistics in a Nutshell; Sarah Boslaugh, Paul Watters; 2008

Resources

• Free Statistical Software