Case Control Study

Case-control Study - a particular form of retrospective study that samples a matched group of people who have, and do not have the outcome being studied. A case-control study is a quasi-experimental design, often used in medicine to aid in determining potential contributing factors (cannot determine causality). In this study type exposure is the dependent variable and outcome is independent.

• Example, in this retrospective case-control, medical records were investigated for trends correlated with cervical pain (1).
  1. Mäkela, M., Heliövaara, M., Sievers, K., Impivaara, O., Knekt, P., & Aromaa, A. (1991). Prevalence, determinants, and consequences of chronic neck pain in Finland. American journal of epidemiology, 134(11), 1356-1367.