Applied Statistical Considerations For Clinical Researchers

This essential book details intermediate-level statistical methods and frameworks for the clinician and medical researcher with an elementary grasp of health statistics and focuses on selecting the appropriate statistical method for many scenarios. Detailed evaluation of various methodologies familiarizes readers with the available techniques and equips them with the tools to select the best from a range of options. The inclusion of a hypothetical case study between a clinician and statistician charting the conception of the research idea through to results dissemination enables the reader to understand how to apply the concepts covered into their day-to-day clinical practice. Applied Statistical Considerations for Clinical Researchers focuses on how clinicians can approach statistical issues when confronted with a medical research problem by considering the data structure, how this relates to their study's aims and any potential knock-on effects relating to the evidence required to make correct clinical decisions. It covers the application of intermediate-level techniques in health statistics making it an ideal resource for the clinician seeking an up-to-date resource on the topic.

Thanks to the omnipresent computer, current statistics can include data files of many thousands of values, and can perform any exploratory analysis in less than seconds. This development, however fascinating, generally does not lead to simple results. We should not forget that clinical studies are, mostly, for confirming prior hypotheses based on sound arguments, and the simplest tests provide the best power and are adequate for such studies. In the past few years the authors of this 5th edition, as teachers and research supervisors in academic and top-clinical facilities, have been able to closely observe the latest developments in the field of clinical data analysis, and they have been able to assess their performance. In this 5th edition the 47 chapters of the previous edition have been maintained and upgraded according to the current state of the art, and 20 novel chapters have been added after strict selection of the most valuable and promising novel methods. The novel methods are explained using practical examples and step-by-step analyses readily accessible for non-mathematicians. All of the novel chapters have been internationally published by the authors in peer-reviewed journal, including the American Journal of Therapeutics, the European Journal of Clinical Investigation, The International journal of Clinical Pharmacology and therapeutics, and other journals, and permission is granted by all of them to use this material in the current book. We should add that the authors are well-qualified in their fields of knowledge. Professor Zwinderman is president-elect of the International Society of Biostatistics, and Professor Cleophas is past-president of the American College of Angiology. From their expertise they should be able to make adequate selections of modern methods for clinical data analysis for the benefit of physicians, students, and investigators. The authors, although from a different discipline, one clinician and one statistician, have been working and publishing together for over 10 years, and their research of statistical methodology can be characterized as a continued effort to demonstrate that statistics is not mathematics but rather a discipline at the interface of biology and mathematics. They firmly believe that any reader can benefit from this clinical approach to statistical data analysis.

With over 80 information-packed chapters, Handbook for Clinical Research delivers the practical insights and expert tips necessary for successful research design, analysis, and implementation. Using clear language and an accessible bullet point format, the authors present the knowledge and expertise developed over time and traditionally shared from mentor to mentee and colleague to colleague. Organized for quick access to key topics and replete with practical examples, the book describes a variety of research designs and statistical methods and explains how to choose the best design for a particular project. Research implementation, including regulatory issues and grant writing, is also covered. The book opens with a section on the basics of research design, discussing the many ways in which studies can be organized, executed, and evaluated. The second section is devoted to statistics and explains how to choose the correct statistical approach and reviews the varieties of data types, descriptive and inferential statistics, methods for demonstrating associations, hypothesis testing and prediction, specialized methods, and considerations in epidemiological studies and measure construction. The third section covers implementation, including how to develop a grant application step by step, the project budget, and the nuts and bolts of the timely and successful completion of a research project and documentation of findings: procedural manuals and case report forms collecting, managing and securing data operational structure and ongoing monitoring and evaluation and ethical and regulatory concerns in research with human subjects. With a concise presentation of the essentials for successful research, the Handbook for Clinical Research is a valuable addition to the library of any student, research professional, or clinician interested in expanding the knowledge base of his or her field. Key Features: Delivers the essential elements, practical insights, and trade secrets for ensuring successful research design, analysis, and implementation Presents the nuts and bolts of statistical analysis Organized for quick access to a wealth of information Replete with practical examples of successful research designs Û from single case designs to meta-analysis - and how to achieve them Addresses research implementation including regulatory issues and grant writing "

In 1948 the first randomized controlled trial was published by the English Medical Research Council in the British Medical Journal. Until then, observations had been uncontrolled. Initially, trials frequently did not confirm the hypotheses to be tested. This phenomenon was attributed to low sensitivity due to small samples, as well as inappropriate hypotheses based on biased prior trials. Additional flaws were recognized and, subsequently, were better accounted for: carryover effects due to insufficient washout from previous treatments, time effects due to external factors and the natural history of the condition under study, bias due to asymmetry between treatment groups, lack of sensitivity due to a negative correlation between treatment responses, and so on. Such flaws, mainly of a technical nature, have been largely corrected and led to trials after 1970 being of significantly higher quality. The past decade has focused, in addition to technical aspects, on the need for circumspection in the planning and conducting of clinical trials. As a consequence, prior to approval, clinical trial protocols are now routinely scrutinized by different circumstantial organs, including ethics committees, institutional and federal review boards, national and international scientific organizations, and monitoring committees charged with conducting interim analyses. This book not only explains classical statistical analyses of clinical trials, but also addresses relatively novel issues, including equivalence testing, interim analyses, sequential analyses, and meta-analyses, and provides a framework of the best statistical methods currently available for such purposes. This book is not only useful for investigators involved in the field of clinical trials, but also for all physicians who wish to better understand the data of trials as currently published.

"This is truly an outstanding book. [It] brings together all of the latest research in clinical trials methodology and how it can be applied to drug development.... Chang et al provide applications to industry-supported trials. This will allow statisticians in the industry community to take these methods seriously." Jay Herson, Johns Hopkins University The pharmaceutical industry's approach to drug discovery and development has rapidly transformed in the last decade from the more traditional Research and Development (R & D) approach to a more innovative approach in which strategies are employed to compress and optimize the clinical development plan and associated timelines. However, these strategies are generally being considered on an individual trial basis and not as part of a fully integrated overall development program. Such optimization at the trial level is somewhat near-sighted and does not ensure cost, time, or development efficiency of the overall program. This book seeks to address this imbalance by establishing a statistical framework for overall/global clinical development optimization and providing tactics and techniques to support such optimization, including clinical trial simulations. Provides a statistical framework for achieve global optimization in each phase of the drug development process. Describes specific techniques to support optimization including adaptive designs, precision medicine, survival-endpoints, dose finding and multiple testing. Gives practical approaches to handling missing data in clinical trials using SAS. Looks at key controversial issues from both a clinical and statistical perspective. Presents a generous number of case studies from multiple therapeutic areas that help motivate and illustrate the statistical methods introduced in the book. Puts great emphasis on software implementation of the statistical methods with multiple examples of software code (both SAS and R). It is important for statisticians to possess a deep knowledge of the drug development process beyond statistical considerations. For these reasons, this book incorporates both statistical and "clinical/medical" perspectives.

Glenn Walker and Jack Shostak's Common Statistical Methods for Clinical Research with SAS Examples, Third Edition, is a thoroughly updated edition of the popular introductory statistics book for clinical researchers. This new edition has been extensively updated to include the use of ODS graphics in numerous examples as well as a new emphasis on PROC MIXED. Straightforward and easy to use as either a text or a reference, the book is full of practical examples from clinical research to illustrate both statistical and SAS methodology. Each example is worked out completely, step by step, from the raw data. Common Statistical Methods for Clinical Research with SAS Examples, Third Edition, is an applications book with minimal theory. Each section begins with an overview helpful to nonstatisticians and then drills down into details that will be valuable to statistical analysts and programmers. Further details, as well as bonus information and a guide to further reading, are presented in the extensive appendices. This text is a one-source guide for statisticians that documents the use of the tests used most often in clinical research, with assumptions, details, and some tricks--all in one place. This book is part of the SAS Press program.

Clinical trials are used to elucidate the most appropriate preventive, diagnostic, or treatment options for individuals with a given medical condition. Perhaps the most essential feature of a clinical trial is that it aims to use results based on a limited sample of research participants to see if the intervention is safe and effective or if it is comparable to a comparison treatment. Sample size is a crucial component of any clinical trial. A trial with a small number of research participants is more prone to variability and carries a considerable risk of failing to demonstrate the effectiveness of a given intervention when one really is present. This may occur in phase I (safety and pharmacologic profiles), II (pilot efficacy evaluation), and III (extensive assessment of safety and efficacy) trials. Although phase I and II studies may have smaller sample sizes, they usually have adequate statistical power, which is the committee's definition of a "large" trial. Sometimes a trial with eight participants may have adequate statistical power, statistical power being the probability of rejecting the null hypothesis when the hypothesis is false. Small Clinical Trials assesses the current methodologies and the appropriate situations for the conduct of clinical trials with small sample sizes. This report assesses the published literature on various strategies such as (1) meta-analysis to combine disparate information from several studies including Bayesian techniques as in the confidence profile method and (2) other alternatives such as assessing therapeutic results in a single treated population (e.g., astronauts) by sequentially measuring whether the intervention is falling above or below a preestablished probability outcome range and meeting predesigned specifications as opposed to incremental improvement.

Here is a new book on methods and issues in clinical research. Its objectives can be summarized in three points. 1. Integrate medical and statistical components of clinical research. 2. Do justice to the operational and practical requirements of clinical research. 3. Give space to the ethical implications of methodological issues in clinical research. The book ends with a brief description of the drug development process and the phases of clinical development.

Recent Statistical techniques are one of the basal evidence for clinical research, a pivotal in handling new clinical research and in evaluating and applying prior research. This book explores various choices of statistical tools and mechanisms, analyses of the associations among different clinical attributes. It uses advanced statistical methods to describe real clinical data sets, when the clinical processes being examined are still in the process. This book also discusses distinct methods for building predictive and probability distribution models in clinical situations and ways to assess the stability of these models and other quantitative conclusions drawn by realistic experimental data sets. Design of experiments and recent posthoc tests have been used in comparing treatment effects and precision of the experimentation. This book also facilitates clinicians towards understanding statistics and enabling them to follow and evaluate the real empirical studies (formulation of randomized control trial) that pledge insight evidence base for clinical practices. This book will be a useful resource for clinicians, postgraduates scholars in medicines, clinical research beginners and academicians to nurture high-level statistical tools with extensive scope.