Cost-effectiveness acceptability curves in the dock: case not proven?

No abstract available

Cost-effectiveness acceptability curves - facts, fallacies and frequently asked questions

Cost-effectiveness acceptability curves (CEACs) have been widely adopted as a method to quantify and graphically represent uncertainty in economic evaluation studies of health-care technologies. However, there remain some common fallacies regarding the nature and shape of CEACs that largely result from the textbook illustration of the CEAC. This textbook CEAC shows a smooth curve starting at probability 0, with an asymptote to 1 for higher money values of the health outcome (). But this familiar ogive shape which makes the textbook CEAC look like a cumulative distribution function is just one special case of the CEAC. The reality is that the CEAC can take many shapes and turns because it is a graphic transformation from the cost-effectiveness plane, where the joint density of incremental costs and effects may straddle quadrants with attendant discontinuities and asymptotes. In fact CEACs: (i) do not have to cut the y-axis at 0; (ii) do not have to asymptote to 1; (iii) are not always monotonically increasing in ; and (iv) do not represent cumulative distribution functions (cdfs). Within this paper we present a gallery of CEACs in order to identify the fallacies and illustrate the facts surrounding the CEAC. The aim of the paper is to serve as a reference tool to accompany the increased use of CEACs within major medical journals

Control/structure interaction design methodology

The Control Structure Interaction Program is a technology development program for spacecraft that exhibit interactions between the control system and structural dynamics. The program objectives include development and verification of new design concepts (such as active structure) and new tools (such as a combined structure and control optimization algorithm) and their verification in ground and possibly flight test. The new CSI design methodology is centered around interdisciplinary engineers using new tools that closely integrate structures and controls. Verification is an important CSI theme and analysts will be closely integrated to the CSI Test Bed laboratory. Components, concepts, tools and algorithms will be developed and tested in the lab and in future Shuttle-based flight experiments. The design methodology is summarized in block diagrams depicting the evolution of a spacecraft design and descriptions of analytical capabilities used in the process. The multiyear JPL CSI implementation plan is described along with the essentials of several new tools. A distributed network of computation servers and workstations was designed that will provide a state-of-the-art development base for the CSI technologies

Workmen\u27s Compensation: Recovery under the Positional Risk Doctrine for Personally Motivated Assaults

While performing duties for her employer, Lillian A. Schick was killed by her former husband. The employer manufactured tablepads and decedent’s job was to measure the tables of the retail outlet customers. Using an assumed name, Mrs. Schick’s former husband formulated and elaborate ruse whereby Mrs. Schick was sent to measure his table. Upon her arriving at his apartment he killed her and committed suicide. The referee of the Workmen’s Compensation Appeals Board issued a take nothing award, finding that injury and death did not arise out of the employment. On petition for reconsideration, the Workmen’s Compensation Appeals Board awarded compensation finding that the employment did contribute to the death by placing decedent in an isolated location and thereby facilitating the assault. The Court of Appeal annulled the award, accepting petitioner’s contention that the injury and death were caused by an assault originating in a personal dispute and thus could not arise out of the employment relationship. The Workmen’s Compensation Appeals Board’s petition for a hearing before the California Supreme Court was granted. Held, affirmed: Mrs. Schick’s duties placed her in an isolated location, which facilitated and thus contributed to her death. California Compensation and Fire Co. v. Workmen’s Compensation and Appeals Board, 68 Adv. Cal. 155, 436 P.2d 67, 65 Cal. Rptr. 155 (1968)