This completely updated edition of Exposure Assessment in Environmental Epidemiology offers a practical introduction to exposure assessment methodologies in environmental epidemiologic studies. In addition to methods for traditional methods -- questionnaires, biomonitoring -- this new edition is expanded to include geographic information systems, modeling, personal sensoring, remote sensing, and OMICs technologies. In addition, each of these methods is contextualized within a recent epidemiology study, maximizing illustration for students and those new to these to these techniques. With clear writing and extensive illustration, this book will be useful to anyone interested in exposure assessment, regardless of background.

What agents should be measured? How should measurement be performed and what averaging time should be used for the measurement? What sampling strategy should be employed to characterize exposures across individuals, locations, and time? What durations of exposure should be characterized? What statistical descriptors should be used to relate exposure to effect? Exposure Assessment for Epidemiology and Hazard Control examines various approaches to answering these and other important questions. Other topics discussed include the measurement of current exposures (e.g., vapors, gases, aerosols, and complex mixtures); the application of toxicological relationships, including biological markers and sample models; an epidemiological evaluation of exposure-effect relationships, including new methods for effect evaluation and models for population exposure estimates; and strategies for exposure assessment, such as biological sampling interpretation through toxicokinetic processes. This important new volume contains essential information for industrial hygienists, epidemiologists, occupational health physicians, toxicologists, and immunologists.

Determining the health risks to humans of exposure to toxic substances in the environment is made difficult by problems such as measuring the degree to which people have been exposed and determining causationâ€"whether observed health effects are due to exposure to a suspected toxicant. Building on the well-received first volume, Environmental Epidemiology: Hazardous Wastes and Public Health, this second volume continues the examination of ways to address these difficulties. It describes effective epidemiological methods for analyzing data and focuses on errors that may occur in the course of analyses. The book also investigates the utility of the gray literature in helping to identify the often elusive causative agent behind reported health effects. Although gray literature studies are often based on a study group that is quite small, use inadequate measures of exposure, and are not published, many of the reports from about 20 states that were examined by the committee were judged to be publishable with some additional work. The committee makes recommendations to improve the utility of the gray literature by enhancing quality and availability.

What agents should be measured? How should measurement be performed and what averaging time should be used for the measurement? What sampling strategy should be employed to characterize exposures across individuals, locations, and time? What durations of exposure should be characterized? What statistical descriptors should be used to relate exposure to effect? Exposure Assessment for Epidemiology and Hazard Control examines various approaches to answering these and other important questions. Other topics discussed include the measurement of current exposures (e.g., vapors, gases, aerosols, and complex mixtures); the application of toxicological relationships, including biological markers and sample models; an epidemiological evaluation of exposure-effect relationships, including new methods for effect evaluation and models for population exposure estimates; and strategies for exposure assessment, such as biological sampling interpretation through toxicokinetic processes. This important new volume contains essential information for industrial hygienists, epidemiologists, occupational health physicians, toxicologists, and immunologists.

This User’s Guide is a resource for investigators and stakeholders who develop and review observational comparative effectiveness research protocols. It explains how to (1) identify key considerations and best practices for research design; (2) build a protocol based on these standards and best practices; and (3) judge the adequacy and completeness of a protocol. Eleven chapters cover all aspects of research design, including: developing study objectives, defining and refining study questions, addressing the heterogeneity of treatment effect, characterizing exposure, selecting a comparator, defining and measuring outcomes, and identifying optimal data sources. Checklists of guidance and key considerations for protocols are provided at the end of each chapter. The User’s Guide was created by researchers affiliated with AHRQ’s Effective Health Care Program, particularly those who participated in AHRQ’s DEcIDE (Developing Evidence to Inform Decisions About Effectiveness) program. Chapters were subject to multiple internal and external independent reviews. More more information, please consult the Agency website: www.effectivehealthcare.ahrq.gov)

From the use of personal products to our consumption of food, water, and air, people are exposed to a wide array of agents each day-many with the potential to affect health. Exposure Science in the 21st Century: A Vision and A Strategy investigates the contact of humans or other organisms with those agents (that is, chemical, physical, and biologic stressors) and their fate in living systems. The concept of exposure science has been instrumental in helping us understand how stressors affect human and ecosystem health, and in efforts to prevent or reduce contact with harmful stressors. In this way exposure science has played an integral role in many areas of environmental health, and can help meet growing needs in environmental regulation, urban and ecosystem planning, and disaster management. Exposure Science in the 21st Century: A Vision and A Strategy explains that there are increasing demands for exposure science information, for example to meet needs for data on the thousands of chemicals introduced into the market each year, and to better understand the health effects of prolonged low-level exposure to stressors. Recent advances in tools and technologies-including sensor systems, analytic methods, molecular technologies, computational tools, and bioinformatics-have provided the potential for more accurate and comprehensive exposure science data than ever before. This report also provides a roadmap to take advantage of the technologic innovations and strategic collaborations to move exposure science into the future.