Announcing the special August joint meeting of the WA Branch of the Statistical Society of Australia and the Australasian Region of the International Biometric Society.

Date: Tuesday, 8 August 2023
Time: 6:00PM
Location: Blakers Lecture Theatre, The University of Western Australia.

Please RSVP for dinner afterwards by contacting Mario D'Antuono (mario24freo@gmail.com, 0480 123 071) by 12noon, Monday, 7 August 2023.

Presentation

Designing Efficient Clinical Trials

Michael Dymock, Telethon Kids Institute (TKI)

Clinical trial design emerged from agricultural “field experiments” almost a century ago; from a methodological perspective, most trials have evolved little from this basic approach. Such designs remain popular because they have become familiar and their rules for implementation have become ingrained in generations of clinicians. However, developments in statistics, computing, causal inference, and decision theory mean our cookie-cutter approach to designing clinical trials is no longer necessary, appropriate, or resource-efficient.

In this talk, I will motivate the departure from fixed trial designs with the introduction of adaptive designs, where the trial design itself adapts in response to the accrued data. Adaptive trials are more complicated to design and difficult to implement, but I will argue that in many situations the benefits outweigh the costs and we have a responsibility to “do better” with our research. A vaccine trial will be used as a toy example throughout the talk as I demonstrate how to use simulations to design an adaptive trial. I will close with some thoughts on how to design efficient trials to directly address the decision-making of clinicians and consumers and pose some questions on where to from here.

About the Speaker

Michael Dymock is a biostatistician based at the Telethon Kids Institute. He designs methods for safety signal detection in the AusVaxSafety active surveillance of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout and is designing platform trials for COVID-19 booster vaccinations, chronic otitis media and BK viraemia in recipients of kidney transplants. His research interests involve the use of Bayesian methods in adaptive clinical trials, computational statistics, and novel methods for vaccine safety surveillance.

Refreshments and Dinner

Members, visitors, and guests are invited to mingle over wine and cheese from 5:30PM.

Following the meeting you are invited to dine with the speaker and fellow attendees at 7:30PM sharp at Steve's Bar and Cafe.

NB: RSVP to Mario D'Antuono (mario24freo@gmail.com, 0480 123 071) by 12noon, Monday, 7 August 2023.

The evening will include a complimentary first drink and coffee/tea/cake dessert on behalf of the two societies.

Meeting directions

The Blakers Lecture Theatre is located on the ground floor of the Mathematics building at The University of Western Australia. Its entrance is on the northern side of the building. See: Campus Map, Google Maps.

Parking is free on the UWA Crawley campus after 5:00PM. A convenient place to park is Car Park 18 accessible from Fairway Entry 1.

For further information please contact the WA Branch Secretary (ssa.wa.secretary@gmail.com).