Reference no: EM133866947
Case study; Statistical significance is heavily dependent on the study's sample size; with large sample sizes, even small treatment effects (which are clinically inconsequential) can appear statistically significant; therefore, the reader has to interpret carefully whether this "significance" is clinically meaningful. A study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology compared overall survival in 569 patients with advanced pancreatic cancer who were randomised to receive erlotinib plus gemcitabine versus gemcitabine alone.[4] Median survival was found to be "significantly" prolonged in the erlotinib/gemcitabine arm (6.24 months vs. 5.91 months, P = 0.038). The P = 0.038 means that there is only a 3.8% chance that this observed difference between the groups occurred by chance (which is less than the traditional cut-off of 5%) and therefore, statistically significant.
In this example, the clinical relevance of this "positive" study is the "treatment effect" or difference in median survival between 6.24 and 5.91 months - a mere 10 days, which most oncologists would agree is a clinically irrelevant "improvement" in outcomes, especially when considering the added toxicity and costs involved with the combination.
1. Do you think the topic is appropriate for the article?
2. What are the various variable in the article that can be used to come up with an appropriate model? (provide all the variables)
3. What are restriction enzymes? How do these enzymes participate in recombinant DNA technology?
4. What are DNA ligases? How do these enzymes participate in recombinant DNA technology?
5. What are plasmids?
6. How is genetic engineering used to create bacteria capable of producing human insulin?
7. What is cloning?
8. What is PCR? How does PCR works?
9. What molecular biology principle is the basis for DNA fingerprinting?
10. Why are recombinant DNA technology and nucleus transplantation technology still dangerous?
11. What is the main moral problem regarding the cloning of human individuals?