Statistics from Scratch: An Introduction for Health Care Professionals

This is a down-to-earth, user-friendly guide to elementary statistics, designed specifically to help today?s health care professionals acquire the skills necessary to collect, interpret, describe and present sample data in a clear, unambiguous and focused manner. No previous knowledge?other than simple mathematics?is assumed. Key features include:

• Practical tips on how to obtain and interpret basic descriptive statistics.
• Detailed explanation of the crucial distinctions between different types of sample data.
• Invaluable help in choosing the most appropriate ways of summarising data.
• Comprehensive coverage of a wide variety of tasks from methods of data collection to the best ways of presenting data.
• Use of real data in a host of helpful work-through examples and end-of-chapter exercises.
• A multitude of illustrative cases, in every chapter, drawn from current literature and practice.
• Detailed and explicit help in using several commonly available computer packages for data analysis including SPSS, MINITAB, and EPI.
• Liberal use of explanatory graphs.

Ideal for both students and professionals, in health care and medicine, who are approaching the subject of statistics for the first time, this book presents enough information to carry out basic analytical tasks while also providing a solid foundation on which to build detailed knowledge for more complex work. That?s what you call a measure of spread!

This is a down-to-earth, user-friendly guide to elementary statistics, designed specifically to help today's health care professionals acquire the skills necessary to collect, interpret, describe, and present sample data in a clear, unambiguous, and focused manner. No previous knowledge, other than simple mathematics, is assumed. It offers practical tips on how to understand and critically evaluate the statistical sections of research studies and reports, and covers a wide variety of tasks from simple data collection to more complex analysis of treatments and outcomes. Detailed and explicit help in using commonly available computer packages, including SPSS, MINITAB, and EPI is also given.