Pharmaceutical Statistics Using SAS

14.1. Introduction

We all make thousands of decisions every day. Decision-making is part of most areas of life. Consequently, decision analysis has applications in many areas of the society, business and, not least, medicine. Within the medical fields, decision analysis has, quite naturally, most often been used in order to find the optimal strategy for diagnosing and treating patients (e.g., Parmigiani, 2002, Chapters 5–6; Bertolli et al, 2003; Liu et al, 2003). The analysis is often made for a population although attempts have been made to also include the preferences of the individual patient (Protheroe et al, 2000; Elwyn et al, 2001). In health economics, the benefits of a treatment are weighed against its costs, and these components are ...