BACKGROUND Immunohistochemical (IHC) assessment of estrogen receptor (ER) and progesterone receptor (PR) status has become a routine practice to predict the likely outcome of Tamoxifen therapy. AIMS To assess the interobserver variation in scoring hormone receptor status of breast carcinoma, using the Quick Score. MATERIALS AND METHODS IHC-stained slides of breast carcinomas reported by the...

The breakdown point behavior of M-estimators in linear models with xed designs, arising from planned experiments or qualitative factors, is characterized. Particularly, this behavior at xed designs is quite diierent from that at designs which can be corrupted by outliers|the situation prevailing in the literature. For xed designs, the breakdown points of robust M-estimators (those with bounded ...

BACKGROUND Fatigue is a prominent symptom in persons with rheumatoid arthritis (RA). Although this symptom has been described to vary in duration and frequency little is known about fluctuations in fatigue over time and season. The aim of this study was to describe monthly and seasonal variations in fatigue, in persons with RA of working age. METHODS Sixty-five participants diagnosed with RA ...

BACKGROUND The INTER-NDA is a novel assessment of early child development measuring cognition, language, motor skills, behaviour, attention, and socio-emotional reactivity in 2 year olds in 15 minutes. Here, we present the results of an evaluation of the INTER-NDA against the Bayley Scales of Infant Development III edition (BSID-III), its sensitivity and specificity and its psychometric propert...

A study was designed to evaluate observer variation in the assessment of radiographic deterioration of individual patients using the Larsen grading system. Radiographs of hands and feet of 52 patients were assessed by three observers. Each patient had paired films taken one year apart which were assessed together for change in score. To assess within-observer variation each set of films was rea...

This study shows that 1936-1990 preschool blood lead trends explain 65% of the 1948-2001 variation in USA mental retardation (MR) prevalence, 45% of the 1953-2003 variation in the average scholastic achievement test (SAT) verbal score, and 65% of the 1953-2003 variation in the average SAT math score. These temporal relationships are characterized by best-fit time lags (highest R(2) and t-value ...

SUMMARY We introduce a new phylogenetic comparison method that measures overall differences in the relative branch length and topology of two phylogenetic trees. To do this, the algorithm first scales one of the trees to have a global divergence as similar as possible to the other tree. Then, the branch length distance, which takes differences in topology and branch lengths into account, is app...

OBJECTIVE To compare night visit rates in different electoral wards of one general practice with the Jarman and Townsend deprivation scores and unemployment rates. DESIGN Analysis of computerised workload data. SETTING General practice in centre of Mansfield, Nottinghamshire. OUTCOME MEASURE Visits made in 588 nights to the 11,998 patients on the practice list. RESULTS Night visit rates...

It is a common observation that stricture patients with severe dysphagia may have a wide lumen, while others with a narrow stricture have few swallowing complaints. In 64 patients with benign oesophageal stricture the dysphagia score (determined by questionnaire and by a test meal both based on nine different items of food scored according to their solidity) was compared with the diameter of th...

Introduction. The most important aim of teacher evaluation by students is feedback to teachers in order to inform the negative and positive points of their lectures and manners. The aim of this study was to investigate teachers’ attitudes towards the report of their evaluation results and effective factors in assessment variation. Methods. The research was a descriptive study using a questionn...