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Z-Chomosome t1_ixvmzpz wrote

Reply to comment by H2AK119ub in Brain cancer vaccine succeeds at prolonging survival in Phase 3 trial by Sorin61

Can’t you just look at historical data? The way statistics are used in medicine seems deeply Byzantine.

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H2AK119ub t1_ixvn8f6 wrote

You need exquisite controls when looking at historical data. Modern medicine has advanced incredibly in the past 20 years with technology and that can significantly blur the data.

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Kraz_I t1_ixwj8i4 wrote

Can useful statistical data be gleaned from many hundreds or thousands of case studies, considering how common case studies are recorded for cancer patients?

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Rodot t1_ixx2lzk wrote

Yes, to highest order the fractional error (percentage of the outcomes the error represents) goes as the inverse square root of the number of samples. Barring other factors such as experimental design and representation of the samples, you're usually hitting around 1% error at 100 samples.

One doesn't actually need a ton of samples to get good statistical significance depending on the design and results of the study. Of course, there are factors that can increase or decrease these rates depending on if you are getting a little Bayesian or not

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