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Peter White et al: Releasing patient data from the PACE trial for chronic fatigue syndrome

Chrisb

Senior Member
Messages
1,051
There seems to be ambiguity. Does White think it acceptable for analysis plans to be altered at any time up to the initial interpretation of results, and what, for these purposes would constitute an initial interpretation of results?

Is this why he considers the changes to PACE acceptable.
 

Yogi

Senior Member
Messages
1,132
Peter White said
We fear that having such an agreement as part of the consent to participate in a clinical trial would put off a significant number of potential participants, particularly if the trial was of treatments of a stigmatised illness, such as CFS.

The issues we raise here concern not only the PACE trial but also many other studies, as concerns about patient consent apply to all medical research programmes involving people, including studies into sensitive topics and stigmatised illnesses.

Cheeky B@$*@#d !!! He along with Sharpe and Chalder and Wessely were the ones to stigmatise the disease.

Word fails me.
 

Jonathan Edwards

"Gibberish"
Messages
5,256
"A pre-specified analysis plan is important for ensuring that subsequent analyses and interpretations of the data are unbiased, that there is no duplication of work, and that analysis plans remain unaltered following the initial interpretation of results."

This is a very peculiar statement which, again, seems to confirm that the authors really do not understand basic methodology. If there is a predefined analysis plan then the initial interpretation must be the execution of that plan. So there are no plans to remain unaltered after execution. There are no more plans. It seems as if they want to suggest that nobody else can set up new analysis plans after the first interpretation - i.e. execution of the original analysis plan. But this has never been the way things work. Re-analysis of Mendel's work showed that he fiddled his data, even if he got the right answer. Re-analysis of data is the bedrock of a central activity in science called peer review. The job of the reviewer is to see if his or her analysis of the data confirms that the authors' analysis is legitimate. Moreover duplication of work is another central activity in science, in the form of replication. The idea that scientists have a moral duty to stop other people wasting their time duplicating their work is bizarre.

Whatever the PACE authors think they meant by this sentence it is completely spurious.
 

aimossy

Senior Member
Messages
1,106
I was actually struggling to mentally try and figure out what that statement was really saying, it seemed confused with making up some excuse for controlling data analysis but wasn't making plausible sense..
 

Jonathan Edwards

"Gibberish"
Messages
5,256
I was actually struggling to mentally try and figure out what that statement was really saying, it seemed confused with making up some excuse for controlling data analysis but wasn't making plausible sense..

Yup. You might even have been mentally trying to struggle to actually figure out or actually figuring out how to struggle mentally, but I doubt it would have made much difference!
 

Glycon

World's Most Dangerous Hand Puppet
Messages
299
Location
ON, Canada

Keith Geraghty

Senior Member
Messages
491
an undergrad knows that changing your methods mid trial is risky; dropping your threshold for improvement by circa 25% lower than you first started out with, looks plain mad; and then turning around after and saying it had no difference on the result - is plain stupid.

take your pick - sad, mad or bad
 
Last edited:

Marky90

Science breeds knowledge, opinion breeds ignorance
Messages
1,253
an undergrad knows that changing your methods mid trial is risky; dropping your threshold for improvement by circa 35% lower than you first started out with, looks plain mad; and then turning around after and saying it had no difference on the result - is plain stupid.

take your pick - sad, mad or bad

All three o_O