Ann Thorac Surg 2000;69:1754
© 2000 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons
Discussion
Discussion
DR DARRYL S. WEIMAN (Memphis, TN): In the myocardial ischemia group, you really had 5 dogs, and as divided, 2 had 3 hours of ischemia and 3, 6 hours of ischemia. How did you get p values that were significant in only a 3-dog sample and a 2-dog sample?
DR MIRALIAKBARI: What I should have emphasized was the number of biopsies performed in each animal. Also, if we take away the biopsy sites and look at the samples with reference to time only, there will be enough n to figure out significance, and we saw significance here. Of course, we would like to have had more animals. In the laboratory now, we are working on reproducing this experiment with more animals, and with a fewer number of biopsies, we are able to obtain n.
DR WEIMAN: So you just kept taking biopsy samples until the number became significant. I am not sure it is fair in a study like this to do that.
DR MIRALIAKBARI: No, we did not keep on doing biopsies. This experiment was performed once, and the data were tabulated afterward. We did not go back and redo the whole thing.
