Readable research linked to original sources
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Browse normalized, publication-ready research with direct links to its evidence and source.
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Readable research linked to original sources
Browse normalized, publication-ready research with direct links to its evidence and source.
Loading articles data…
Readable research linked to original sources
Browse normalized, publication-ready research with direct links to its evidence and source.
15 articles
Newest firstBackground China faces significant mental health challenges, with unique associations between mental disorders and other traits observed in its population. Methods Based on summary statistics of existing genome-wide association studies in East Asian ancestry (EAS) and European ancestry (EUR) populations, we tested the associations of polygenic scores (PGSs) for schizophrenia (SCZ) and major depression (MD) with 25…
Open article record in new tab ↗Timeliness of therapy initiation is a fundamental determinant of outcomes for many medical conditions, most importantly, cancer. Yet, existing inefficiencies in healthcare systems mean that delays between diagnosis and treatment frequently adversely affect the clinical outcome for cancer patients. Although estimates of effects of lag time to therapy would be informative to policymakers considering resource allocat…
Open article record in new tab ↗Masataka et al.'s cannabis gateway study misrepresents the 43.8% probability of cannabis users transitioning to illegal drugs as "rare," and misuses regression via the Table 2 Fallacy. These critical issues discredit their conclusion.
Open article record in new tab ↗Although substance use is associated with a shortened lifespan, impeded health and accelerated biological ageing, the factors contributing to the associations between substance use and ageing are poorly understood. We used summary statistics from genome-wide association studies (GWAS) to investigate whether substance involvement (N from 28K to 2M)-including alcohol, tobacco, cannabis and opioid use and use disorde…
BackgroundConventional statistical methods in medical research often fail to capture real-world complexity due to rigid parametric assumptions, particularly normality, which frequently do not hold for clinical and epidemiological data. Heterogeneous distributions, heavy-tailed patterns, and multimodal structures are common in healthcare data, yet conventional methods often fail to capture these structural characte…
Open article record in new tab ↗High-dimensional medical datasets present challenges in feature selection, where traditional methods often prioritize spurious correlations over causally relevant variables, compromising model interpretability and clinical utility. We introduce CausalDRIFT, a causal feature selection algorithm grounded in the Frisch-Waugh-Lovell theorem and Double Machine Learning, which estimates the Average Treatment Effect (ATE…
Open article record in new tab ↗The role of social support in the recovery of stroke survivors has been a subject of considerable interest. It has been hypothesized that social support may positively influence functional outcomes through various mechanisms, including enhanced adherence to rehabilitation programs, reduced psychological stress, and improved overall well-being [1]. However, establishing a clear causal link between social support an…
Open article record in new tab ↗BackgroundAssociation between cannabis use and development of atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease (ASCVD) is inconsistent and challenging to interpret, given existing study limitations.MethodsSixty five independent single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), obtained from a genome-wide association study on lifetime cannabis use, were employed as genetic instruments to estimate the effects of genetically indexed can…
Appraisals of the evidence on the relationship between cannabis use and psychosis are often biased by appraisers' pre-existing views on whether adult cannabis use should or should not be legal. This viewpoint gives examples of such policy-biased appraisals and suggests strategies for avoiding them.
Open article record in new tab ↗AbstractBackgroundObservational studies have found Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) to be associated with an increased risk of adverse outcomes as well as with early risk factors; however it is not clear whether these associations reflect causal effects. Alternatives to traditional observational studies are needed to investigate causality: one such design is Mendelian randomization (MR), which uses…
Open article record in new tab ↗Aims To estimate the effect of recreational legalization on cannabis use frequency and sources of variance across legal environments. Design Longitudinal discordant twin and gene-environment interaction models in twins recruited from birth records and assessed prospectively. Setting The United States, including states with different recreational cannabis policies before and after 2014, when recreational cannabis w…
Electronic health records (EHRs) provide a rich source of observational patient data that can be explored to infer underlying causal relationships. These causal relationships can be applied to augment medical decision-making or suggest hypotheses for healthcare research. In this study, we explored a large-scale EHR dataset on patients with asthma or related conditions (N = 14,937). The dataset included integrated…
Open article record in new tab ↗Background Although studies have examined the association between tobacco and cannabis use in adolescence with subsequent cognitive functioning, study designs are usually not able to distinguish correlation from causation. Methods Separate patterns of tobacco and cannabis use were derived using longitudinal latent class analysis based on measures assessed on five occasions from age 13-18 in a large UK population c…
Open article record in new tab ↗BackgroundAlthough studies have examined the association between tobacco and cannabis use in adolescence with subsequent cognitive functioning, study designs are usually not able to distinguish correlation from causation. MethodsSeparate patterns of tobacco and cannabis use were derived using longitudinal latent class analysis based on measures assessed on five occasions from age 13 to 18 in a large UK population…
Open article record in new tab ↗Background Marijuana and alcohol each play a significant role in fatal crash initiation. We decomposed the total effect of marijuana use in the presence or absence of alcohol on fatal crash initiation into direct and indirect effects. Methods Pair-matched data on 5856 culpable drivers (initiators) and 5856 nonculpable drivers (noninitiators) involved in the same fatal 2-vehicle crashes recorded in the Fatality Ana…
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