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The epidemiology module of the "Quer-
schnittsbereich" epidemiology, medical
biometry and medical informatics for medical
students is organized by the Prof. Becher,
and various members of the unit together
with colleagues from the DKFZ (German Can-
cer Research Centre) are involved in teaching
in them. The epidemiology module in the
Master of Science in International Health
course as well as other courses within the
institute are also taught by unit staff.
Furthermore, training courses for doctoral
students in epidemiology have been develo-
ped and taught within the PhD programme
"Graduiertenkolleg 793". This is outlined
in the teaching chapter on page 74 of the
report. Unit members are also involved in
various other teaching activities.
The unit offers epidemiological support to
all members of the medical faculty. This
has led to various collaborations in a range
of different areas, such as oral health and
cardiology.
Members of the unit are involved in nume-
rous other academic activities within and
outside the faculty. Prof. Becher has been
recently nominated by the epidemiological
societies in Germany as a representative for
epidemiology in the German Research Foun-
dation (DFG) and was elected for his second
period which runs from 2012 to 2016. Pre-
viously, he has also been President of the
German Society of Epidemiology.
The unit has been successful in terms of
publications and several grant applications.
A sample of major research projects are
briefly outlined in the following.
Infectious disease epidemiology
and health reporting in low- and
middle-income countries
Project team:
Heiko Becher, Heribert Ramroth, Gisela
Kynast-Wolf, Anja Schoeps, Eveline Otte im
Kampe, Eva Lorenz, Gabriele Stieglbauer, Olaf
Müller, Nobila Ouedraogo, Volker Winkler
External Collaborators:
Dr. Ali Sié and CRSN staff, Nouna, Burkina
Faso; Dr. Osman Sankoh and INDEPTH,
Accra, Ghana; Prof. Peter Byass and colle-
agues, Umeå, Sweden
Our research projects in this area focus on
three main aspects. The first is a better
understanding of the temporal and spatial
distribution of overall mortality in gene-
ral and malaria mortality in particular in
countries with high malaria transmission.
The second is to contribute to the planning
and analysis of large intervention trials,
for example to investigate the effects of
insecticide-treated bednets, or to compare
different vaccination schemes and their
effect on overall mortality. Our long standing
collaborations with the Centre de Recherche
en Santé de Nouna (CRSN), Burkina Faso,
and with the international network for the
demographic evaluation of populations
and their health in developing countries
(INDEPTH) in Accra, Ghana, enable us to use
large and high-quality databases for this
Mortality rates by malaria for children less than five years of age by year, Nouna HDSS
(crosses: original rates, blue: average, red: model)
According to physical coded verbal autopsy