Researchers are interested in the prognosis for pancreatic cancer with a novel t

Question

Researchers are interested in the prognosis for pancreatic cancer with a novel treatment aimed at increasing life span in patients suffering from the disease. However, the researchers have noted a significant increase in likelihood of a number of other adverse events. In order to assess the adverse events in the patient population, the researchers have gathered information regarding the following co-variables: age at diagnosis (years), ethnicity (Caucasian, African American, Hispanic/Latino, Asian American, Other), family history of the disease (Y, N), BMI (kg/m2). Question: Please describe each variable (Prognosis, age, ethnicity, family history, and BMI) to be included in the analysis with regards to its type. (dichotomous, continuous, ordinal, categorical etc.)

Explanation / Answer

1. Prognosis : Continuous variable.

2. Age : Continuous variable which can further be defined as a ratio variable since age 0 = no age. A person who is 30 years old is half as old as someone who is 60, and twice as old as someone who is 15. This satisfies the definition of ratio variable.

3. Ethnicity : categorical nominal variable since it has many categories which cannot be ordered.

4. Family history : Dichotomous/ binary variable since it has only two options yes or no.

5. BMI : Continuous ratio variable. Same explanation as that of age.

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