Improving the error rates of the Begg and Mazumdar test for publication bias in fixed effects meta-analysis.

ABSTRACT:

Background

The rank correlation test introduced by Begg and Mazumdar is extensively used in meta-analysis to test for publication bias in clinical and epidemiological studies. It is based on correlating the standardized treatment effect with the variance of the treatment effect using Kendall's tau as the measure of association. To our knowledge, the operational characteristics regarding the significance level of the test have not, however, been fully assessed.

Methods

We propose an alternative rank correlation test to improve the error rates of the original Begg and Mazumdar test. This test is based on the simulated distribution of the estimated measure of association, conditional on sampling variances. Furthermore, Spearman's rho is suggested as an alternative rank correlat

SUBMITTER: Gjerdevik M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4193136 | biostudies-literature | 2014 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature