Resumo

MARTINEZ BETANCUR, Octavio. Causal judgment by Sir Austin Bradford Hill criteria: leukemias and radiation. rev.fac.med. [online]. 2010, vol.58, n.3, pp.236-249. ISSN 0120-0011.

This paper presents an interpretive reading based on the proposed causal inference by Austin Bradford Hill; of the document "Radiation-related leukemia in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, 1946-1964. I. Distribution, incidence, and Appearance time". The document prepared by the committee of the atomic bomb victims, full filed all nine "criteria" proposed by Bradford Hill; and between its limitations include the assumption of genetic homogeneity of the exposed and the linearity of the effects of radiation in leukemia, in addition to only consider age as a confounding variable. Moreover, the number of deaths from leukemia, the gold standard for sensitivity and specificity of the surveillance system in the study of life span was 61 deaths from leukemia among the survivors located within 1500 meters from the epicenter of the explosion and 25 in the group located between 1,501 and 10,000 meters, fact which talks about possible underreporting of cases and over diagnosis by the sum of criteria used.. Hill’s "criteria" are not logical but methodological rules which help in the process of deciding the causal inference in epidemiology. Such "criteria» are independent from the discussion about what kind of logic, deductive or inductive, is applied in the inferences process. Causal judgment based on Hill’s "criteria" should be understood pragmatically as «inference of the best explanation» in the context of abduction. Within the framework of "inference of the best explanation" the only permitted conclusion is that exist good reasons to seriously consider the hypothesis of the statistical association as a causal relationship

Palavras-chave : radiation-induced leukemia; causality.

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