Paul C Lambert

..The choice of 'vague' prior distribution can lead to a marked variation in results, particularly in small studies. Sensitivity to the choice of prior distribution should always be assessed...

..We compare the estimates of relative survival and the cure fraction between the 2 types of model and also investigate the importance of modeling the ancillary parameters in the selected parametric distribution for both types of model...

..All models presented in this paper can be estimated within a generalized linear models framework and thus can be implemented using standard software...

..A multivariate random-effects meta-analysis must incorporate and estimate the between-study correlation (rhoB)...

..This raises issues regarding the appropriateness of the use of random effect models when designing and drawing inferences across a series of studies...

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..We describe an alternative approach using Poisson based Generalised Linear Models (GLMs)...

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..Dissemination bias, in how and what outcomes are reported or published, may be causing this incompleteness. This article illustrates these problems and presents possible sensitivity analyses to allow the most reliable conclusions...

..To quantify the effectiveness of pharmacological and lifestyle interventions to prevent or delay type 2 diabetes in people with impaired glucose tolerance...

..To obtain predicted costs on the original cost scale (rather than the log-cost scale) two different retransformation factors were applied. All analyses were carried out using Bayesian Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) simulation methods...

..Secondly, the new method uses more recent trends to dictate the future projections than previously proposed methods...

..This can be obtained by pooling all ages or, more commonly, by using age-standardisation. The various methods for providing a single figure estimate of relative survival can give very different estimates...

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..We use statistical models to further develop the method of period analysis, providing more up-to-date estimates of survival and the ability to explore differences in survival by covariates and adjust for case mix...

..In addition, the Bayesian models provide an intuitive and simple way to investigate the within-subject variance components...

..The models estimate the interrelationships between the four cost components and survival, and thus enable a predictive distribution for each missing cost item to be obtained...

..One potential bias when using relative survival that is most often overlooked occurs when there are a high proportion of deaths due to a specific cancer in the external group...

..Relative survival, the ratio of the observed and the expected survival rates, is applied routinely in cancer studies and may improve on current methods for assessment of survival in CHD...

..The reasons for these impressive increases in patient survival are complex, but are highly likely to be strongly related to many improvements in cancer care over this same time period...

..Survival from breast cancer is lower in the UK than in some other European countries. We compared survival in England and Norway by age and time from diagnosis...

..The potential benefits and harms of a treatment policy may differ between individuals. If these benefits and harms are not evaluated distinctly, and in a quantitative framework, transparency can be lost in the decision-making process...

..However, under some circumstances the prospective likelihood has been shown to produce identical results and it is usually preferred for its simplicity. In our meta-analyses the two likelihoods give very similar results...

..However, it is well documented that cause of death information taken from death certificates is often lacking in accuracy and completeness...

..We provide user-friendly Stata software...

..Experimental Design: A well-defined, reproducible search strategy was used to identify the relevant literature from 1966 to February 2000...

..They arise when a patient is at risk of more than one mutually exclusive event, such as death from different causes, and the occurrence of one of these may prevent any other event from ever happening...