NBSS: changes were made, suspicious changes were not
CMAJ 1997;157:250
Re: The review of randomization in the Canadian National
Breast Screening Study: Is the debate over? [editorial], Dr.
Norman F. Boyd CMAJ 1997;156:207-9 [full text / résumé]
In response to: C.J. Baines
To my eye and, I suspect, to anyone else's, the first quotation cited by Dr. Baines clearly states that no erasures were found. The article she cites concerns women 40 to 49 years of age; it is in this group that Bailar and McMahon found erasures. Whether the absence of "suspicious erasures" claimed in the article concerning women 50 to 59 years of age would be confirmed by a similar examination, we do not know.
The need for any erasures in the randomization lists is far from clear. Although, as Baines states, the NBSS did enrol a large number of women, names were entered on randomization lists only after the completion of several procedures. Why, after a woman has completed 2 questionnaires, undergone a breast examination and signed a consent form, there should be any remaining doubt about her name, is something that I do not understand.
Norman F. Boyd, MD
Head
Division of Epidemiology and Statistics
Ontario Cancer Institute
Professor of Medicine
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ont.
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