Research and statistics: case-control studies.

摘要

Starting with the disease makes the case-control design particularly useful for studying rare diseases, such as IIH. Because the outcome (disease) is known at the beginning of the study, a much smaller number of subjects is needed to detect differences in relative risk associated with suspected risk factors. In addition, because information usually is evaluated retrospectively, large numbers of risk factors can be examined without significant cost. The ability to review significant numbers of risk factors easily makes generation of the hypotheses another important strength of the case-control design.