We all eat, and most of us eat many different foods, yet we tend to forget rather quickly what we have eaten, and we often do not know the ingredients of the dishes we consume. These aspects make it hard to conduct nutritional epidemiological research, which is why it is important to learn how to overcome a number of specific challenges. This course will cover the most important ones, while helping you to design a well-constructed nutritional epidemiological study.
The course will address methodological aspects involved in the design, conduct, analysis and interpretation of nutritional epidemiological research. You will learn about a whole range of subjects, including intra-individual variation, measurement of error, misclassification, correlated variables, population homogeneity, dietary assessment, validity/reproducibility of dietary assessment, nutritional biomarkers, and analysis issues such as energy adjustment methods and dietary pattern analyses. By studying these, you will gain the knowledge you need to ensure that your nutritional epidemiological research is accurate and the results valid. To succesfully complete this course you will need a degree in Life Sciences, a medical education is not required.
By the end of the course, you should be able to:
• Design a well-constructed nutritional epidemiological study
• Explain the basic design considerations for nutritional epidemiological research
• Explain different methods of dietary assessment and their advantages/disadvantages for different study designs
• Explain the reproducibility and validity of different dietary assessment methods
In particular, you should be able to:
• Name sources of variation in the diet
• Use nutrition composition tables
• Use dietary biomarkers to assess dietary exposure
• Explain and utilize different methods to adjust for energy intake
• Use different methods to perform dietary pattern analyses
• Locate sources of measurement errors in dietary data, and apply different methods to correct these errors
• Adjust nutrient intake for total energy intake and perform dietary pattern analyses
• Dietary assesment
• Nutritional epidemiology in global health
• Biomarkers of nutritional intake
• Adjustments for energy intake
• Adjusting for multicollinearity in nutritional variables
• Dietary patterns
• Validity & reproducibility of dietary assessment methods
To successfully complete this course, you need to actively participate in the discussion forums and complete the learning unit assignments, including:
• Demonstrating active participation in the forums and assignments overall (25% of the final mark)
• Creating a presentation (either on paper or as a Powerpoint, perhaps together with an optional video) with a group of peers (75% of the final mark). You are allowed to redo the final assignment once.
To enroll in this course, you need:
• A Bachelor’s degree in life sciences (or the equivalent)
• Sufficient proficiency in English reading and writing
• Basic skills in working with the computer program SPSS or R
• Access to the computer program SPSS or the free program R
• Sufficient understanding of epidemiology, study design and data analysis. Elevate courses offering this knowledge include Introduction to Epidemiology, Study Design in Etiologic Research and Classical Methods in Data Analysis
We offer discounts for participants from Low- and Lower-middle-income Countries. Utrecht University and UMC Utrecht employees and students are eligible for a 10% discount. Unfortunately, we don’t offer any scholarships.
No, there aren’t any set times you should be online as it is an asynchronous course. All the web lectures are already pre-recorded. However there will be deadlines each week (during the week as well on weekends). Each week consists of approximately 14 study hours. To experience maximum interaction, we advise you to log in several times per week. Furthermore, you should be aware that the teacher and the e-moderator are off on weekends.
No, this is not possible because the course contains group assignments, so you can’t work ahead. Each week, a new learning unit will be made available. This means that not all the learning units are open simultaneously. Additionally, you can’t catch up on the course because there are deadlines to meet every week.
After enrollment, you will receive a confirmation email. A week before the course officially starts, you will receive an email with more detailed information and planning.
If you have ordered a course and paid immediately, you will receive an email with your login details. Sometimes, this email ends up in your spam folder. If you already have an existing account, simply log in to our learning environment. The course you just ordered will be visible in your account.
If you paid by invoice, you will receive your login credentials as soon as the invoice is paid. If the course is starting soon and you haven’t received your login details, please reach out to us at info@elevatehealth.eu to inquire about the payment status.
When you have completed all the assignments or have finished the exam with a good grade, you will receive an official certificate from Utrecht University. All academic certificates issued by Utrecht University will be sent by mail to the address registered in your account. Since these certificates are official documents, they cannot be sent by email.
We believe that future-proof research is essential for good care. That is why we combine innovative medical knowledge with didactics. Thanks to our extensive network and proven didactic methods, we make Life Sciences and Health professionals better than yesterday.
Close pop-up
Fill in the details below and you will be notified once this course is available again
