• Ann Pharmacother · May 1996

    Comparative Study

    Combining event rates from clinical trials: comparison of Bayesian and classical methods.

    • X Y Su and A Li Wan Po.
    • Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom.
    • Ann Pharmacother. 1996 May 1; 30 (5): 460-5.

    ObjectiveTo compare an empirical Bayesian, a fully Bayesian, and a classical fixed-effect (Peto) method for pooling event rates from separate epidemiologic studies or clinical trials.DesignFour data sets used in meta-analyses by previous authors were evaluated. The first data set concerned death rates observed in clinical trials of beta-blockers, the second to lung cancer and smoking in 14 case-control studies, the third to drowsiness induced by the antihistamine compound chlorpheniramine, and the fourth to the use of intravenous magnesium in patients with suspected myocardial infarction. Randomly chosen data points were made more extreme to test the methods further.Main Outcome MeasuresPooled estimates of effect expressed as odds ratios and their associated 95% confidence intervals.ResultsAll three methods gave comparable results with respect to the 95% confidence interval, although the Bayesian methods gave generally wider interval estimates. However, the point estimates for the individual studies were substantially different, particularly for small studies.ConclusionsFor the data sets considered, Bayesian methods, which are computer intensive but intuitively appealing, provided results that were consistent with the classic fixed-effect Peto method. Introduction of the more extreme data points did not alter this conclusion.

      Pubmed     Full text   Copy Citation     Plaintext  

      Add institutional full text...

    Notes

     
    Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?
    300 characters remaining
    help        
    You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
    • Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as *italics*, _underline_ or **bold**.
    • Superscript can be denoted by <sup>text</sup> and subscript <sub>text</sub>.
    • Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines 1. 2. 3., hyphens - or asterisks *.
    • Links can be included with: [my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com)
    • Images can be included with: ![alt text](https://bestmedicaljournal.com/study_graph.jpg "Image Title Text")
    • For footnotes use [^1](This is a footnote.) inline.
    • Or use an inline reference [^1] to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document [^1]: This is a long footnote..

    hide…