Calculation of Odds Ratio and Relative Risk

As an epidemiologist, you are asked whether eating two burgers from a fast food restaurant daily will lead to at least 20 lbs weight gain in one month. You decide to test the hypothesis by using a cohort study.

Your sample consists of 100 people who ate 2 burgers daily for one month from a fast food restaurant. For comparison purposes you have another set of 100 people who also ate from the same fast food restaurant for one month. But they ate healthy choices instead of burgers. Of course you had sophisticated methods of keeping track and measuring their daily intake. Assuming all things being equal, at the end of the month, 32 of the people who ate burgers had gained 20 lbs or higher, while among those who had healthy choices, 12 were 20 lbs or higher.

Requirements:

  1. Design a 2×2 table of a cohort study to assess the association between eating fast food burgers and 20 lbs weight gain.
    1. Show your calculations.
    2. Provide a 1-3 paragraph interpretation of the results.
  2. Design a 2×2 table of a case control study.
    1. How would you calculate and interpret the measure of association?
  3. Based on your results, what would you recommend?

Your paper should:

  • be 1-2 pages in length.
  • show how you calculated your answers.
  • be free of spelling and grammar errors.