Many clinical trials restrict randomisation using stratified blocks or minimisation to balance prognostic factors across treatment groups. It is widely acknowledged in the statistical literature that the subsequent analysis should reflect the design of the study, and any stratification or minimisation variables should be adjusted for in the analysis. However, a review of recent general medical ...

In recent years, a number of infrastructures have been proposed for the collection and distribution of medical data for research purposes. The design of such infrastructures is challenging: on the one hand, they should link patient data collected from different hospitals; on the other hand, they can only use anonymised data because of privacy regulations. In addition, they should allow data dep...

OBJECTIVE Establishing an association between high chronic stress levels and variables considered to be negative regarding the stress profile for Mexican migrants living in Edmonton, Canada. METHODS A simple random technique was used for choosing the target population; the sample size involved 58 migrants. The Nowack Stress Profile and Maslach Burnout Inventory were used to identify immigrant...

BACKGROUND The use of restricted randomisation methods such as minimisation is increasing. This paper investigates under what conditions it is preferable to use restricted randomisation in order to achieve balance between treatment groups at baseline with regard to important prognostic factors and whether trialists should be concerned that minimisation may be considered deterministic. METHODS...