Main description:

Tony Waldron has years of experience teaching and advising researchers how best to approach the study of the occurrence of disease in past populations. In this volume he provides a detailed methodological overview for measuring the incidence and prevalence of disease, which can be applied to assemblages of skeletons, mummies or even historical data. The book includes an overview of the principal methods of measuring disease frequency, methods of comparison with other studies, and discusses problems relating to the special nature of the dataset being analysed in archaeological research and the extrapolation of the results from a dead to a living population. A complete theoretical and practical account of how to approach epidemiological problems as applied to past populations, this volume will be a useful addition to the bookshelf of all those with an academic or professional interest in the study of disease in historic populations.

Contents:

Introduction 1 Assemblages, Populations and Samples 2 Outcome Measure 3 Measures of Disease Frequency: Incidence and Prevalence 4 Comparison of Disease Frequencies 5 Proportional Morbidity or Mortality Ratio 6 Analytical Epidemiology 7 Study Design 8 Occupation and the Skeleton 9 Conclusions