INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVE:
Most of important variables measured in medicine are in numerical forms or continuous in nature. New instruments and tests are constantly being developed for the purpose of measuring various variables, with the aim of providing cheaper, non-invasive, more convenient and safe methods. When a new method of measurement or instrument is invented, the quality of the instrument has to be assessed. Agreement and reliability are both important parameters in determining the quality of an instrument. This article will discuss some issues related to methods comparison study in medicine for the benefit of medical professional and researcher.
METHOD:
This is a narrative review and this article review the most common statistical methods used to assess agreement and reliability of medical instruments that measure the same continuous outcome. The two methods discussed in detail were the Bland-Altman Limits of Agreement, and Intra-class Correlation Coefficient (ICC). This article also discussed some issues related to method comparison studies including the application of inappropriate statistical methods, multiple statistical methods, and the strengths and weaknesses of each method. The importance of appropriate statistical method in the analysis of agreement and reliability in medicine is also highlighted in this article.
CONCLUSION:
There is no single perfect method to assess agreement and reliability; however researchers should be aware of the inappropriate methods that they should avoid when analysing data in method comparison studies. Inappropriate analysis will lead to invalid conclusions and thus validated instrument might not be accurate or reliable. Consequently this will affect the quality of care given to a patient.
The popularity of ultrasound for acute diagnosis of fractures in the Emergency Department (ED) has increased over the recent years. This present study aimed to determine the sensitivity and specificity of ultrasound use for detection of fractures in a different environment, which is at the triage area of the ED. We compared the results of bedside ultrasound in detecting non-critical fractures to the current gold standard of X-rays in the triage area. The design was a single centered crosssectional study. From August 2014 till November 2014, a total of 46 patients were recruited, creating 75 image pairs. Following consent, a bedside ultrasound was performed and subsequently compared with X-ray reporting regarding the presence or absence of fractures. SPSS analysis was used to determine the sensitivity and specificity of ultrasound in diagnosing fracture as compared to X-rays. Ultrasound had a sensitivity of 72% (95% CI, 50.6% - 87.9%) and a specificity of 80% (95%CI: 66.3 - 90%) when compared to X-rays in fracture diagnosis. The kappa analyses showed moderate inter observer agreement (0.5) between ultrasound and X-rays in diagnosing fractures. This study suggests that the use of ultrasound as a triage tool yet has unacceptable sensitivity and needs further evaluation and consideration.
Cassava chips that exist in the current market have no standardisation and cannot be stacked
nicely into cylindrical container. The objectives of this work are to determine the different dimension of cassava chips produced with different thickness and to develop stackable chips during mass production. Fresh cassava tubers were harvested, washed, peeled and sliced. The thickness measurements used were 1.0 mm, 1.5 mm, 1.75 mm and 2.0 mm and 1.27 mm thickness was measured from commercial potato chips as a controlled sample. Then, it was fried in deep fat fryer with the temperature of 170°C. For each thickness studied, different
numbers of slice (10, 20, 30 and 40 slices) were fried simultaneously. Results showed that there
are 6 shapes of fried chips produced during the frying. To conclude, thickness of the slice and
number of slices fried simultaneously give impact towards the shape of fried chip.
The aim of this work was to investigate the effect of glycerol concentration on mechanical
and physical properties of gellan gum (GG) biofilm. The biofilm was prepared using solvent
casting method and the effective glycerol concentration was found to be within 30-50%
w/w (based on GG weight). At 60 and 70 w/w% of glycerol, the films started to distort
because the films was flexible and brittle. As glycerol concentration was increased the tensile
strength (TS) and Youngs modulus (E) of films decreased. Somehow, elongation at break
(EAB), water vapor transmission rate (WVTR) and swelling of films was increased. Glycerol
plasticized GG biofilm was thermally stable and flexible, proposed its can be exploited as
film-forming material and with optimized glycerol concentration it has good mechanical and
physical properties for edible biofilm.
Introduction: Owing to the variety of materials and methods employed, comparison of the results and findings from bonding studies is difficult. Until recently, several types of teeth have been used in published research papers as a substrate in orthodontic bonding research including bovine incisors, fresh and rebonded human premolars. Objectives: The purpose of this study was to compare the shear bond strength of an adhesive bonded to different tooth surfaces (human premolar, bovine incisor and rebonded human premolar). Methods: Two groups of thirty premolar teeth and one group of bovine incisors had brackets attached in a standardized manner using Transbond XT (3M Unitek). The adhesive was cured using conventional halogen light and a specially designed tool to standardize the distance between the light curing tip and the adhesive. The debonding force was measured using Instron universal testing machine. ANOVA and Post Hoc Dunnett C test were performed to determine any significant difference among groups (p