Tag: statistics

PLoS One. 2021 Jun 2;16(6):e0252656. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0252656. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

The Open Payments database reports payments made to physicians by industry. Given the potential for financial conflicts of interest relating to patient outcomes, further scrutiny of these data is valuable. Therefore, the objective of this study was to analyze physician-industry relationships by specialty type, payment type, geospatial trend, and longitudinal trend between 2014-2018. We conducted an observational, retrospective data analysis of payments from the Open Payments database for licensed United States physicians listed in the National Plan & Provider Enumeration System (NPPES). Datasets from 2013-2018 were joined using the Python programming language. Aggregation and sub-setting by characteristics of interest was done in R to calculate means and frequencies of reported general physician payments from industry across different specialties, locations, timeframes, and payment types. Normalization was applied for numbers of physicians or payments. Geospatial statistical hot spot analysis was conducted in ArcGIS. 51.73 million payment records were analyzed. In total, 50,047,930 payments were issued to 771,113 allopathic or osteopathic physicians, representing $8,702,631,264 transferred from industry to physicians over the five-year period between 2014 and 2018. The mean payment amount was $179, with a standard deviation of $12,685. Variability in physicians’ financial relationships with industry were apparent across specialties, regions, time, and payment type. A limited match rate between records in the NPPES and Open Payments databases may have resulted in selection bias of trends related to physician characteristics. Further research is necessary, particularly in the context of changing industry payment trends and public perceptions of the appropriateness of these relationships.

PMID:34077460 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0252656

PLoS One. 2021 Jun 2;16(6):e0252582. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0252582. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

Languages emerge and change over time at the population level though interactions between individual speakers. It is, however, hard to directly observe how a single speaker’s linguistic innovation precipitates a population-wide change in the language, and many theoretical proposals exist. We introduce a very general mathematical model that encompasses a wide variety of individual-level linguistic behaviours and provides statistical predictions for the population-level changes that result from them. This model allows us to compare the likelihood of empirically-attested changes in definite and indefinite articles in multiple languages under different assumptions on the way in which individuals learn and use language. We find that accounts of language change that appeal primarily to errors in childhood language acquisition are very weakly supported by the historical data, whereas those that allow speakers to change incrementally across the lifespan are more plausible, particularly when combined with social network effects.

PMID:34077472 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0252582

PLoS One. 2021 Jun 2;16(6):e0252556. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0252556. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we consider Dagum distribution which is capable of modeling various shapes of failure rates and aging criteria. Based on progressively type-I interval censoring data, we first obtain the maximum likelihood estimators and the approximate confidence intervals of the unknown parameters of the Dagum distribution. Next, we obtain the Bayes estimators of the parameters of Dagum distribution under the squared error loss (SEL) and balanced squared error loss (BSEL) functions using independent informative gamma and non informative uniform priors for both scale and two shape parameters. A Monte Carlo simulation study is performed to assess the performance of the proposed Bayes estimators with the maximum likelihood estimators. We also compute credible intervals and symmetric 100(1 – τ)% two-sided Bayes probability intervals under the respective approaches. Besides, based on observed samples, Bayes predictive estimates and intervals are obtained using one-and two-sample schemes. Simulation results reveal that the Bayes estimates based on SEL and BSEL performs better than maximum likelihood estimates in terms of bias and MSEs. Besides, credible intervals have smaller interval lengths than confidence interval. Further, predictive estimates based on SEL with informative prior performs better than non-informative prior for both one and two sample schemes. Further, the optimal censoring scheme has been suggested using a optimality criteria. Finally, we analyze a data set to illustrate the results derived.

PMID:34077455 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0252556

PLoS One. 2021 Jun 2;16(6):e0250892. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0250892. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

Using an own survey on wage expectations among students at two Swiss institutions of higher education, we examine the wage expectations of our respondents along two main lines. First, we investigate the rationality of wage expectations by comparing average expected wages from our sample with those of similar graduates; further, we examine how our respondents revise their expectations when provided information about actual wages. Second, using causal mediation analysis, we test whether the consideration of a rich set of personal and professional controls, inclusive of preferences on family formation and number of children in addition to professional preferences, accounts for the difference in wage expectations across genders. Results suggest that both males and females overestimate their wages compared to actual ones and that males respond in an overconfident manner to information about realized wages. Personal mediators alone cannot explain the indirect effect of gender on wage expectations; however, when combined with professional mediators, this results in a quantitatively large reduction in the unexplained effect of gender on wage expectations. Nonetheless, a non-negligible and statistically significant direct (or unexplained) effect of gender on wage expectations remains in several, but not all specifications.

PMID:34077428 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0250892

PLoS One. 2021 Jun 2;16(6):e0252094. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0252094. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

INTRODUCTION: Sugar-sweetened beverage (SSB) taxes have been implemented worldwide to raise revenue and reduce consumption of SSBs, which is associated with health harms. Empirical evaluations have found that these taxes are successful at reducing demand for SSBs; however, SSB taxes face opposition, in part because of claims that they will lead to substantial job losses. The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of the San Francisco SSB tax, implemented on January 1st, 2018, on employment.

METHODS: Monthly employment counts were obtained from the Bureau of Labor Statistics from January 2013 (5-years pre-tax) through December 2019 (2-years post-tax) for the overall economy, private sector, supermarkets and other grocery stores, convenience stores, limited-service restaurants, and beverage manufacturing. A synthetic control analysis was conducted for each employment outcome. The synthetic controls (i.e., estimated counterfactuals) were generated from a pool of urban control counties using pre-tax labor market-related characteristics.

RESULTS: The synthetic controls had similar labor market-related characteristics and employment outcomes to those in San Francisco in the pre-tax period. Up to 2 years post-tax, differences in employment between San Francisco and the synthetic controls were small and not “statistically significant” based on placebo tests for all employment outcomes.

CONCLUSIONS: Up to two years post-tax, we do not find evidence that the San Francisco SSB tax negatively impacted net employment, employment in the private sector, or employment in specific SSB-related industries.

PMID:34077430 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0252094

PLoS One. 2021 Jun 2;16(6):e0251709. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0251709. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Diabetes mellitus (DM) patients are at increased risk of developing drug therapy problems (DTPs). The patients had a variety of comorbidities and complications, and they were given multiple medications. Medication therapy management (MTM) is a distinct service or group of services that optimize therapeutic outcomes for individual patients. The study assessed the impact of provision of MTM service on selected clinical and humanistic outcomes of diabetes patients at the diabetes mellitus clinic of Tikur Anbessa Specialized Hospital (TASH).

METHODS: A pre-post interventional study design was carried out at DM clinic from July 2018 to April 2019. The intervention package included identifying and resolving drug therapy problems, counseling patients in person at the clinic or through telephone calls, and providing educational materials for six months. This was followed by four months of post-intervention assessment of clinical outcomes, DTPs, and treatment satisfaction. The interventions were provided by pharmacist in collaboration with physician and nurse. The study included all adult patients who had been diagnosed for diabetes (both type I & II) and had been taking anti-diabetes medications for at least three months. Patients with gestational diabetes, those who decided to change their follow-up clinic, and those who refused to participate in the study were excluded. Data were analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS). Descriptive statistics, t-test, and logistic regressions were performed for data analyses.

RESULTS: Of the 423 enrolled patients, 409 fulfilled the criteria and included in the final data analysis. The intervention showed a decrease in average hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c), fasting blood sugar (FBS), and systolic blood pressure (SBP) by 0.92%, 25.04 mg/dl, and 6.62 mmHg, respectively (p<0.05). The prevalence of DTPs in the pre- and post-intervention of MTM services was found to be 72.9% and 26.2%, respectively (p<0.001). The overall mean score of treatment satisfaction was 90.1(SD, 11.04). Diabetes patients of age below 40 years (92.84 (SD, 9.54)), type-I DM (93.04 (SD, 9.75)) & being on one medication regimen (93.13(SD, 9.17)) had higher satisfaction score (p<0.05).

CONCLUSION: Provision of MTM service had a potential to reduce DTPs, improve the clinical parameters, and treatment satisfaction in the post-intervention compared to the pre-intervention phase.

PMID:34077431 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0251709

Food Addit Contam Part A Chem Anal Control Expo Risk Assess. 2021 Jun 2:1-15. doi: 10.1080/19440049.2021.1921282. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Probabilistic exposure and risk assessment of chemical hazards in the diet have increasingly gained ground in recent years as a pragmatic approach for the approximation of reality. This work presents the outcomes of a project which aimed at applying probabilistic techniques for basic modelling of chronic dietary exposure to food contaminants following EFSA guidance. These techniques, based on Monte Carlo Risk Assessment (MCRA) software and on the programming language R, were employed for the risk assessment of cadmium for Austrian adults, enabling the validation and the critical comparison of the two approaches. Harmonisation and optimisation of procedures, refinement of exposure assessment skills and confidence in the results were the main benefits. Data amount and validity were identified as critical parameters, influencing the precision of the results. Cadmium was selected as a case study due to its toxicological properties, its ubiquitous presence in food and the availability of Austrian occurrence data. Similar exposure and risk estimates were generated through MCRA and R in alternative optimistic and pessimistic exposure scenarios, suggesting low levels of concern, except for vegetarians, whose upper tail exposures are close to the established Tolerable Weekly Intake. However, as occurrence data gaps have been identified as the major element of uncertainty, the estimated exposure and risk levels are characterised as underestimated. Grains and grain-based products, potatoes and leafy vegetables are the main contributors to the intake. The results will contribute to risk management and to a future refinement of the assessment.

PMID:34077339 | DOI:10.1080/19440049.2021.1921282

PLoS Comput Biol. 2021 Jun 2;17(6):e1009064. doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1009064. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Technological advances have enabled us to profile multiple molecular layers at unprecedented single-cell resolution and the available datasets from multiple samples or domains are growing. These datasets, including scRNA-seq data, scATAC-seq data and sc-methylation data, usually have different powers in identifying the unknown cell types through clustering. So, methods that integrate multiple datasets can potentially lead to a better clustering performance. Here we propose coupleCoC+ for the integrative analysis of single-cell genomic data. coupleCoC+ is a transfer learning method based on the information-theoretic co-clustering framework. In coupleCoC+, we utilize the information in one dataset, the source data, to facilitate the analysis of another dataset, the target data. coupleCoC+ uses the linked features in the two datasets for effective knowledge transfer, and it also uses the information of the features in the target data that are unlinked with the source data. In addition, coupleCoC+ matches similar cell types across the source data and the target data. By applying coupleCoC+ to the integrative clustering of mouse cortex scATAC-seq data and scRNA-seq data, mouse and human scRNA-seq data, mouse cortex sc-methylation and scRNA-seq data, and human blood dendritic cells scRNA-seq data from two batches, we demonstrate that coupleCoC+ improves the overall clustering performance and matches the cell subpopulations across multimodal single-cell genomic datasets. coupleCoC+ has fast convergence and it is computationally efficient. The software is available at https://github.com/cuhklinlab/coupleCoC_plus.

PMID:34077420 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pcbi.1009064

PLoS One. 2021 Jun 2;16(6):e0252160. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0252160. eCollection 2021.

ABSTRACT

Clinical expertise has since 1891 a Swedish counterpart in proven experience. This study aims to increase our understanding of clinicians’ views of their professional expertise, both as a source or body of knowledge and as a skill or quality. We examine how Swedish healthcare personnel view their expertise as captured by the (legally and culturally relevant) Swedish concept of “proven experience,” through a survey administered to a simple random sample of Swedish physicians and nurses (2018, n = 560). This study is the first empirical attempt to analyse the notion of proven experience as it is understood by Swedish physicians and nurses. Using statistical techniques for data dimensionality reduction (confirmatory factor analysis and multidimensional scaling), the study provides evidence that the proven experience concept is multidimensional and that a model consisting of three dimensions-for brevity referred to as “test/evidence”, “practice”, and “being an experienced/competent person”-describes the survey responses well. In addition, our results cannot corroborate the widely held assumption in evidence-based medicine that an important component of clinical expertise consists of experience of patients’ preferences.

PMID:34077421 | DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0252160

Food Addit Contam Part A Chem Anal Control Expo Risk Assess. 2021 Jun 2:1-8. doi: 10.1080/19440049.2021.1923820. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

Carmines (E120) are used worldwide as natural food colouring agents of animal origin, with a widespread application, including yoghurts. Despite being considered safe for human health, carmines are known to cause allergic reactions. Our goal was to evaluate the presence of carmines in different yoghurts with a label declaration of E120, purchased in Portugal, and, for the first time, to assess the human risk. The analytical methodology, recommended by JECFA, was based on acid hydrolysis of the samples followed by spectrophotometric UV-Vis analysis at 494 nm. This methodology allowed for a limit of quantification (LOQ) of 39.0 mg/kg and recovery rates higher than 97.7%. All the samples had carmines at levels above the LOQ, ranging between 43.8 and 193.8 mg/kg, with an average of 125.2 ± 34.5 mg/kg. In total, 8 (26.7%) samples exceeded the European Union (EU) maximum permitted level (MPL) established for carmines in this foodstuff, 150 mg/kg. Solid yoghurts presented higher average levels, 137.2 mg/kg, when compared to liquid samples, 107.2 mg/kg, with a significant statistical difference (p= 0.0236) being observed. No significant statistical difference was observed between white and private labels, whose average levels were very similar, 125.4 vs 125 mg/kg, respectively. Although some samples were above the allowable values, the estimated daily intake (EDI), designed for the different scenarios of different yoghurt types, did not exceed the established ADI, 5 mg/kg bw/day. According to the obtained results, carmine ingestion through the consumption of yoghurt poses low risk to the Portuguese consumers. However, children were the most vulnerable population group with a calculated risk value of up to 10% considering the mean content scenario. These first findings point out the need to reinforce surveillance programmes and monitoring studies, contributing to an increased awareness regarding carmine exposure, however it must be emphasised that yoghurt has evident nutritional benefits depending on a healthful consumer choice.

PMID:34077331 | DOI:10.1080/19440049.2021.1923820