Background: Regarding the analysis of RCT data there is a debate going on whether an adjustment for the baseline value of the outcome variable should be made. When an adjustment is made, there is a lot of misunderstanding regarding the way this should be done. Therefore, the aims of this educational paper are: 1) to explain different methods used to estimate treatment effects in RCTs, 2) to illustrate the different methods with a real life example and 3) to give an advise on how to analyse RCT data.
Methods: Longitudinal analysis of covariance, repeated measures analysis in which also the baseline value is used as outcome and the analysis of changes were theoretically explained and applied to an example dataset investigating a systolic blood pressure lowering treatment.
Results: It was shown that differences at baseline should be taken into account and that regular repeated measures analysis and regular analysis of changes did not adjust for the baseline differences between the groups and therefore lead to biased estimates of the treatment effect. In the real life example, due to the differences at baseline between the treatment and control group, the different methods lead to different estimates of the treatment effect.
Conclusion: Regarding the analysis of RCT data, it is advised to use longitudinal analysis of covariance or a repeated measures analysis without the treatment variable, but with the interaction between treatment and time in the model.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.conctc.2018.03.008 | DOI Listing |
Sci Rep
December 2024
School of Mechanical Engineering, Qilu University of Technology (Shandong Academy of Sciences), Jinan, 250353, China.
Microtextured microneedles are tiny needle-like structures with micron-scale microtextures, and the drugs stored in the microtextures can be released after entering the skin to achieve the effect of precise drug delivery. In this study, the skin substitution model of Ogden's hyperelastic model and the microneedle array and microtexture models with different geometrical parameters were selected to simulate and analyse the flow of the microtexture microneedle arrays penetrating the skin by the finite-element method, and the length of the microneedles was determined to be 200 μm, the width 160 μm, and the value of the gaps was determined to be 420 μm. A four-pronged cone was chosen as the shape of microneedles, and a rectangle was chosen as the shape of the drug-carrying microneedle.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFSci Rep
December 2024
Clinical Nursing Teaching and Research Section, The Second XiangYa Hospital, Central South University, No139, Renmin Road, Changsha, 410011, China.
Prostate cancer, a common malignancy in older men, often requires laparoscopic radical prostatectomy, considered the gold standard treatment. However, postoperative complications can significantly impact quality of life and psychological well-being. The emergence of mobile internet health management offers a promising approach for accessible and effective post-discharge care.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFCommun Med (Lond)
December 2024
Rostock Medical Breath Research Analytics and Technologies (ROMBAT), Department of Anesthesiology, Intensive Care Medicine and Pain Therapy, Rostock University Medical Center, Rostock, Germany.
Background: Menopause driven decline in estrogen exposes women to risk of osteoporosis. Detection of early onset and silent progression are keys to prevent fractures and associated burdens.
Methods: In a discovery cohort of 120 postmenopausal women, we combined repeated quantitative pulse-echo ultrasonography of bone, assessment of grip strength and serum bone markers with mass-spectrometric analysis of exhaled metabolites to find breath volatile markers and quantitative cutoff levels for osteoporosis.
Ann Gen Psychiatry
December 2024
University of Campania "Luigi Vanvitelli", Piazza Miraglia 2, 80138, Naples, Italy.
This randomized-controlled study evaluates the effectiveness of a newly developed social cognition rehabilitation intervention, the modified Social Cognition Individualized Activity Lab (mSoCIAL), in improving social cognition and clinical and functional outcomes of persons with schizophrenia recruited in two Italian sites: University of Campania "Luigi Vanvitelli" in Naples and ASST Fatebenefratelli-Sacco in Milan. mSoCIAL consists of a social cognitive training module focusing on different domains of social cognition and of a narrative enhancement module. We assessed changes in social cognition, clinical characteristics and functional variables in patients with schizophrenia who participated in 10 weekly sessions of mSoCIAL or received treatment as usual (TAU).
View Article and Find Full Text PDFJ Biomed Inform
December 2024
Institute of Computer Science, University of Tartu, 51009 Tartu, Estonia; STACC, 51009 Tartu, Estonia.
Objective: This study aims to address the gap in the literature on converting real-world Clinical Document Architecture (CDA) data into the Observational Medical Outcomes Partnership (OMOP) Common Data Model (CDM), focusing on the initial steps preceding the mapping phase. We highlight the importance of a repeatable Extract-Transform-Load (ETL) pipeline for health data extraction from HL7 CDA documents in Estonia for research purposes.
Methods: We developed a repeatable ETL pipeline to facilitate the extraction, cleaning, and restructuring of health data from CDA documents to OMOP CDM, ensuring a high-quality and structured data format.
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