Lung Cancer and Radon - confounding

[FIELDRW@aol.com]

In a message dated 11/16/98, 10:34:23 AM,alvarez@auxier.com (Joe Alvarez)
writes


A Rejoinder to R.W. Field Answering Otto Raabe's Post by Joe Alvarez
and Fritz Seiler

In his paper in HPJ which Dr. Field cites, and in today's mail he makes a 
big to do about the smoking correction.  This is totally beside the point! 
 Neither Otto's post nor ours depend in any way on "the smoking 
correction".  Actually both of our concerns are that NO smoking correction 
be made to the data!  Dr. Field is still too much concerned with the 'true' 
dose-effect relationship, and does not notice that the raw measurements 
already contain the smoking effects and can, therefore, be applied directly 
to the prediction population.  His concerns may or may not be important for 
the 'true' concentration-effect relationship, but they are completely 
irrelevant for a correct prediction of risks using Bernie Cohen's data.
If any one wants to read more about the details, we still e-mail out 
preprints.  If the figure does not come out, we can fax you a copy.


Dr. Alvarez,

The issue of a confounder is extremely important and in fact was raised by Dr.
Raabe.  I merely responded to it. 

 Your paper is another issue.  I was not responding to the claims made in your
paper.  I will be glad to respond to the claims in your paper if it gets
published by a main stream peer reviewed journal such as the Health Physics
Journal or American Journal of Public Health.

Bill Field
bill-field@uiowa.edu   
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