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Assessment and monitoring in clinical trials when survival curves have distinct shapes: a Bayesian approach with Weibull modelling
Author(s) -
Lecoutre Bruno,
Mabika Bienvenu,
Derzko Gérard
Publication year - 2002
Publication title -
statistics in medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.996
H-Index - 183
eISSN - 1097-0258
pISSN - 0277-6715
DOI - 10.1002/sim.1042
Subject(s) - weibull distribution , bayesian probability , prior probability , statistics , survival analysis , posterior probability , econometrics , interim analysis , mathematics , computer science , clinical trial , medicine
The comparison of Weibull distributions with unequal shape parameters, in the case of right censored survival data obtained from independent samples, is considered within the framework of Bayesian statistical methodology. The procedures are illustrated with the example of a mortality study where a new treatment is compared to a placebo. The posterior distributions about relevant parameters, which may provide support for a conclusion of clinical superiority of the treatment, and the predictive distributions, which may guide decision about early stopping at an interim analysis, are considered for a class of appropriate priors. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.