Найти книгу: "A Practical Guide to Cluster Randomised Trials in Health Services Research"

Cluster randomised trials are trials in which groups (or clusters) of individuals are randomly allocated to different forms of treatment. In health care, these trials often compare different ways of managing a disease or promoting healthy living, in contrast to conventional randomised trials which randomise individuals to different treatments, classically comparing new drugs with a placebo. They are increasingly common in health services research. This book addresses the statistical, practical, and ethical issues arising from allocating groups of individuals, or clusters, to different interventions. Key features: Guides readers through the stages of conducting a trial, from recruitment to reporting. Presents a wide range of examples with particular emphasis on trials in health services research and primary care, with both principles and techniques explained. Topics are specifically presented in the order in which investigators think about issues when they are designing a trial. Combines information on the latest developments in the field together with a practical guide to the design and implementation of cluster randomised trials. Explains principles and techniques through numerous examples including many from the authors own experience. Includes a wide range of references for those who wish to read further. This book is intended as a practical guide, written for researchers from the health professions including doctors, psychologists, and allied health professionals, as well as statisticians involved in the design, execution, analysis and reporting of cluster randomised trials. Those with a more general interest will find the plentiful examples illuminating.

Planning, preparing, scheduling, and executing SAP test cycles is a time-consuming and resource-intensive endeavor that requires participation from several project members. SAP projects are prone to have informal, ad-hoc test approaches that decrease the stability of the production environment and tend to increase the cost of ownership for the SAP system. Many SAP project and test managers cannot provide answers for questions such as how many requirements have testing coverage, the exit criteria for a test phase, the audit trails for test results, the dependencies and correct sequence for executing test cases, or the cost figures for a previously executed test cycle. Fortunately, through established testing techniques predicated on guidelines and methodologies (i.e., ASAP SAP Roadmap methodology, IBM’s Ascendant methodology, and Deloitte’s ThreadManager methodology), enforcement of standards, application of objective testing criteria, test case automation, implementation of a requirements traceability matrix (RTM), and independent testing and formation of centralized test teams, many of the testing risks that plague existing or initial SAP programs can be significantly reduced. This book is written for SAP managers, SAP consultants, SAP testers, and team leaders who are tasked with supporting, managing, implementing, and monitoring testing activities related to test planning, test design, test automation, test tool management, execution of test cases, reporting of test results, test outsourcing, planning a budget for testing activities, enforcing testing standards, and resolving defects.

The personal home page (PHP) server-side scripting language is particular well adapted to connecting HTML-based web pages to a backend database for dynamic content. This book explains the entire nuts-and-bolts process of the PHP application life cycle: requirements, design, development, maintenance and tuning. It shows how PHP can be used to design and develop highly manageable and secure applications to solve practical problems.

Two new Oracle instruction and resource titles from Osborne/McGraw-Hill are indispensable additions to personal and professional reference collections. Oracle Database 10g: A Beginner's Guide is the collective effort of Oracle experts Ian Abramson, Michael Abbey and Michael Corey. Oracle Database 10g provides neophytes with the fundamental concepts of Oracle Database 10g administration and programming. Through self-paced tutorials, readers will learn about database essentials, the role of the administrator, and large database features. Oracle Database 10g includes an in-depth introduction to SQL, PL/SQL, Java, and XML programming.