Palliative Treatment of Cancer Patients
Cannabis (Cannabis sativa L.) has been legalized for medicinal purposes in many states. Many studies are currently underway regarding the benefits of medical cannabis. One area of interest is the palliative treatment of cancer patients where cannabis is hypothesized to alleviate pain, increase appetite, and improve general well-being.
Medicinal Cannabis Study
In one study, 25 adults with cancer were assessed before and 6 months after using medicinal cannabis. After 6 months, appetite increased in 19 patients, decreased in 2 patients, and remained the same in 4.
1. Assess the impact of cannabis use on appetite statistically (use a two-sided test). Include a p-value.
Answer: The null hypothesis is assumed to be that there is no effect of cannabis on appetite of 25 adults when they used it for 6 months. When the paired t-test is applied, the values of h and p comes out to be:
h=1
p= 1.4362e-05
which means we can reject the null hypothesis. Hence, the paired t-test shows that cannabis do have an impact on the appetite of the adults.
2. What hypothesis test did you run? Explain why you chose this test.
Answer: The paired t-test is applied for the statistical analysis because the effect of cannabis is required to find between before and after its 6 months use by the same population. When the same measurement is taken at two time references, then the paired t-test is applied.
Degree of Change in Appetite Study
Now suppose that the same study was run, but patients are instead graded on the degree of change in appetite on a 5-point scale, with +2 indicating the greatest improvement, 0 indicating no change, and −2 indicating the greatest decrease. Data for the 25 patients is shown in table 1.
Table 1. Degree of change in appetite after 6 months of cannabis use.
| Change Score | Number of Patients |
| +2 | 5 |
| +1 | 15 |
| 0 | 4 |
| -1 | 2 |
| -2 | 0 |
3. Determine if appetite has changed significantly over time in these patients. Include a p-value.
Answer: The application of paired t-test gives the following values:
h=1
p= 2.0268e-05
As the p-value for this test is smaller compared to the pervious case so we can say that the change is appetite for this case is significant compared to previous case.
Hypothesis Test
4. What hypothesis test did you run? Explain why you chose this test.
Answer: The same paired t-test is applied because in this case also the measurement is taking at two different time references (before and after 6 months).
Task One Solution
clc
clear all
close all
%%
%%%%%%%%% Task 1
data=readtable('data.xlsx'); %%%% reading data from excelsheet
data=data{:,:}; %%%% converting table into matrix form
pre=data(:,2); %%%% data of 25 adults before 6 months
post=data(:,3); %%%% data of 25 adults after 6 months
[h,p]=ttest(pre,post,'Alpha',0.01) %%%% application of paired t-test
%%
%%%%%%%%% Task 2
data=readtable('data2.xlsx'); %%%% reading data from excelsheet
data=data{:,:}; %%%% converting table into matrix form
pre=data(:,2); %%%% data of 25 adults before 6 months
post=data(:,3); %%%% data of 25 adults after 6 months
[h,p]=ttest(pre,post,'Alpha',0.01) %%%% application of paired t-test