Marvin Shilmer

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Posts by Marvin Shilmer

• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

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  “When he says "JWs", he's referring to those JWs who live within the area of the four hospitals, even if they weren't actually participants in his study.”

  As a general rule I’d have to disagree with that statement. Nevertheless, in this case we have every reason to think severely anemic JWs refusing blood in New Zealand have a reduced mortality compared to just about anywhere else in the world. Yet my conclusions do not take advantage of this to statistically increase mortality. We also have no reason to think the statistical incidents of severe mortality are anyways increased in the New Zealand study at issue (that are left unaccounted for). Moreover, my conclusions assume there was not as much as a single death at any other trauma center in the given region of a severely anemic JW refusing blood. Again this is to avoid anything that would statistically increase extrapolated mortality values.

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “And therein lies a big problem: the study was done by proponents of blood transfusion, hardly an independent study (and I couldn't find anyone but 'us' citing this study either).”

  Says who?

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “Dare I say it, but do we need to deduct from the figure an estimated number of lives saved by not taking blood?”

  This is a coefficient of the data study because the study included those who refuse blood and those who accept blood. Hence if there were JWs in the study who survived the result of refusing blood then this only reduced the hard count of deaths, and it is the hard count of deaths forming the basis of this information and subsequent calculations.

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “Marvin: do those 4 hospitals treat more or fewer patients with anemia than others in New Zealand?

  “This could be a huge source of variation.”

  Simon,

  In my presentation what you inquire of presents no variation because my presentation assumes other trauma facilities in the same region as the 4 experienced exactly ZERO deaths due to refusal of blood transfusion by severely anemic patients.

  Again, my calculation was performed to arrive at very conservative results.

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “@simon, marvin

  “call me a simpleton but....

  “- Beliaev and Marvin agree 10x mortality for anemic JWs

  “- 0.2/100,000 is the accepted mortality rate for anemic non-JW's

  “- 2/100,000 mortality would be a reasonable assumption for anemic JW's

  “now do the maths. and it ain't 50,000 dead JW;s.”

  besty,

  An annual sample size of 12,700 with an annual population of 3.3 (that would be 33 over 10 years) presents a ratio of 3848-to-1.

  In year 1998 there were 5,544,059 JWs. You do the math and tell readers what a ratio of 3848-to-1 gives us for the year 1998 alone.

  Can you do that, and put this hard number in writing for readers to watch your math?

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “Marvin: you don't seem to 'get' that your tiny study in a small country with some rather unique circumstances simply can't be applied to 'the world' with any degree of accuracy. You can use as many decimal places as you want, but it's precision and not accuracy.”

  You keep saying things like that yet you have failed to express any reason why this data set is not useful for conservative and/or liberal extrapolations based on certain criterion, such as life expectancy in New Zealand compared to the rest of the world, state of healthcare in New Zealand compared to the rest of the world, etc.

  Do we, for instance, have any reason to think there are more or less cases of severe anemia in New Zealand compared to the rest of the world (that are not accounted for in the study)? If so, what are those reasons? My review and conclusions assume the best case scenario in terms of mortality.

  Do we, for instance, have any reason to think outcomes for treating severe anemia in New Zealand are better or worse compared to the rest of the world? If so, what are those reasons? My review and conclusions assume the best case scenario in terms of mortality.

  You’ve made your assertions above. Now prove it.

  My use of these particular statistics is done to keep the numbers as conservative as possible!

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “That's the point - patient outcomes are rarely so binary with certain life or certain death from any treatment.”

  Simon,

  You don’t understand the statistical value of matched comparative studies. Look it up. Then read the article by Beliaev et al.

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “MARVIN, you didn't respond to my earlier question where I asked you point-blank if you contacted the author who conducted the study (AM Belaev, was it?) and ASKED him whether it's statistically valid to take the findings from a geographically-limited study in NZ to extrapolate Worldwide?”

  adamah,

  I have not contacted the author inquiring as you suggest because it’s unnecessary.

  But it if helps your sensibilities you should know the author uses the same data set to make a universal statistical statement saying “compared with JW patients, ARBC transfusion in anaemic patients was associated with a 10 times reduced mortality, lower rates of cardiac, neurologic and infective complications.”

  So if you question whether Dr. Beliaev accepts that the given data set is useful toward a broad extrapolation the answer is yes. He does it himself right within the article.

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “Surely the Marvin extrapolation should be 0.26/10,000?”

  besty,

  The average number of JWs in New Zealand for 1998-2007 is 12,700 in round numbers.

  Statistically, over the same 10-year period there were 33 preventable deaths among these JWs.

  I appreciate you persisting in the particular you do above. It’s made me revisit and revisit and revisit the calculator used in my assessment of this information, which is a good thing. Just now I noticed an algorithm that’s not as labeled. I’m going to look into why this is the case to see if I mislabeled or miscalculated, or perhaps something else. I’ll get back as soon as this reassessment is performed.

  Thanks again for pushing on substance.

  Marvin Shilmer
• 
  739

  250,000 Jehovah's Witnesses have died refusing blood

  by nicolaou in

  1. watchtower
  2. medical

  80+ branch davidian cult members died in waco, texas.

  250,000+ #jehovahswitnesses have died refusing blood.

  stop this #cult!

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
• 

  Marvin Shilmer

  -

  “I must be missing something when I conclude that you believe 0.26/1000 is the JW anemia mortality rate. Can marvin or anybody else help me out with what I am missing?”

  besty,

  I don’t know what I was thinking earlier. Yes, the extrapolated annual rate of preventable death for JWs suffering severe anemia who refuse blood product is .26 per 1000. Put another way, this means each year there is about 1 preventable death per 4,000 Witnesses. In more JW colloquial terms, and using published figures, these numbers mean:

  - In 1961 this would amount to 1 death for refusing blood per 96 congregations. (For a total of 230 preventable deaths)

  - In 1971 this would amount to 1 death for refusing blood per 72 congregations. (For a total of 392 preventable deaths)

  - In 1981 this would amount to 1 death for refusing blood per 77 congregations. (For a total of 584 preventable deaths)

  - In 1991 this would amount to 1 death for refusing blood per 66 congregations. (For a total of 1058 preventable deaths)

  - In 2001 this would amount to 1 death for refusing blood per 62 congregations. (For a total of 1528 preventable deaths)

  - In 2011 this would amount to 1 death for refusing blood per 57 congregations. (For a total of 1878 preventable deaths)

  Marvin Shilmer