Instructor: John Gennari, 616-6641
Class location: Health Sciences T-474
Class times: Tues/Thurs, 9:00am - 10:50pm (a 4-credit course)
Office hours: By apptm.
Course description:
Biomedical and Health Informatics is a broad, multi-discplinary field. To propose, carry out, and report on research in this field, what are the appropriate methodologies that we apply?
In this course, we will cover the breadth of research methodologies used in our field. One important theme for the course is that because BHI is grounded in diverse fields such as computer science, information science, biology, and medicine, the research methods for BHI draw on these varied traditions. The methodologies from these fields are not always compatible -- as an example, there is a strong contrast between the research that may be carried out in a randomized controlled trial of a new drug for clinical research, versus research that examines how people may interact with technology and information from a more descriptive, information-science perspective.
As another theme, all disciplines recognize the importance of evaluation -- how do we know that our work is good, and successfully answers the research questions that we care about?
Because of the breadth of methodologies that we must cover in one quarter, this course will not be sufficient to provide you with all of the details of the particular methodology you may need to carry out your own Ph.D. research. However, it should provide you with enough knowledge to (a) learn more about the research methods you will use, (b) understand how different research methodologies may answer different research questions, and (c) appreciate and understand the BHI literature, which uses this wide variety of research methodologies. Thus, the readings for the course will include a wide variety of examples from the recent scientific literature.
As a high-level course objective, it should improve your ability to recognize good, high-quality research, regardless of the research methodology used. In general, the course should help answer the question "What is good BHI research?"