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Originally Posted by soccertese
"Statistics isn't magic"
you have to assume you are sampling from a normally distributed population, that most candidates are within the normal range of variability and not skewed at the extremes..
considering that many trials include people from all over the country/world, one can assume you are sampling from a normal distribution. most people will be average and a few many standard deviations different.
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No. You can only assume this if the population is big enough. So the big question is ... are clinical trials big enough ? Usually they contain 100 to 200 patients. I don't think that is big enough. The fact that the samples are taken from all over the world doesn't change a thing. It is the amount of people sampled that matters, not the location they live in. And then you also have the problem of the lack of biomarkers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by soccertese
there is research showing tobaco reduces the probability of getting pd, there are no biomarkers, statisticians just survey the data. and yes, i think a 20%neuroprotective benefit could be detected over time without biomarkers.
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There is a big difference in showing something reduces the probability of getting PD and showing something slows down progression of PD. If you follow 1000 people with half of them smoking and the other half not ... in the end you will know exactly who will have PD and who doesn't get it. So you have exact knowledge of everything. This is the equivalent of having the perfect biomarkers. When you want to assess PD progression you don't have this perfect biomarker.
You think it is possible, I think it is not. Of course our opinion is not based on exact science. But the current measure used is not good. People's symptom vary a lot during day. Some persons have better symptoms in the morning, others have better in the evening ... so the score even depends on which person you measure during which time of day and also of the researchers subjective assessment. So based on this I think 20 % neuroprotectiveness can't be measured by trials. And then you also have the placebo effect ruining the results of clinical trials even more. All of this causes problems with the results simply because there are no biomarkers at the moment.
I just can't believe that till now nothing neuroprotective exists. Like the CoQ10 ... the trials said it wasn't neuroprotective ... Well, actually it says neuroprotectiveness can't be proven, which doesn't mean that it isn't neuroprotective. The tests on these human neurons showed it was neuroprotective. I tend to believe the test on the human neurons much more than the clinical trials. CoQ10 protects neurons. Whether taking it orally is enough for neuroprotection I don't know. But if enough CoQ10 gets into the brain, then it must be neuroprotective. I think it just reduces to a problem of delivery. How to get enough CoQ10 into the brain ? And what are the side-effects of CoQ10 on the human body ?