Preventive medicine
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Preventive medicine · Jan 2013
Testing the agreement of medical instruments: overestimation of bias in the Bland-Altman analysis.
The Bland-Altman method is the most popular method used to assess the agreement of medical instruments. The main concern about this method is the presence of proportional bias. The slope of the regression line fitted to the Bland-Altman plot should be tested to exclude proportional bias. The aim of this study was to determine whether the overestimation of bias in the Bland-Altman analysis is still present even when the proportional bias has been excluded. ⋯ Testing the slope of regression line of the Bland-Altman plot does not remove the artifactual bias in the prediction.
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Preventive medicine · Jan 2013
Comparative StudyA comparison of smoking behaviour characteristics between Caucasian smokers in the United Kingdom and Malay smokers in Malaysia.
There is evidence that smoking behaviour differs by ethnicity. This study aims to compare smoking behaviour characteristics between Caucasian and Malay smokers. ⋯ Malays smoke as a means of socially integrating. This has important public health implications. Social reasons and the social environment play a role in smoking uptake, smoking maintenance and smoking cessation and this should be borne in mind for strategies planning to promote smoking cessation.
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Preventive medicine · Jan 2013
Validation of a measure of knowledge about human papillomavirus (HPV) using item response theory and classical test theory.
Public understanding of HPV is important to ensure informed participation in cervical cancer prevention programmes. While many studies have measured HPV knowledge, none has developed a validated measure for use across countries. We aimed to develop and validate such a measure. ⋯ A structurally coherent set of items covering a range of important HPV knowledge was developed. Responses indicated a reliable questionnaire, which allowed the fitting of an IRT model.
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Preventive medicine · Jan 2013
Breast screening and health issues among rural females in Malaysia: how much do they know and practice?
This study investigated rural women's knowledge of breast cancer and screening methods by ethnicity and examined the predictors of breast screening methods. ⋯ Knowledge of breast cancer and its screening uptake varies by ethnicity, location and the type of support received. Efforts and approaches to improve the women's knowledge of breast cancer and its screening uptake therefore should be customized to address the different influencing factors.