Re:Vitamin D supplements lower risk of autoimmune disease, r...
by sooheon on Tuesday March 08, 2022 @11:21PM
(#30610904)
> Here is the article: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35082139/ It’s important to observe that “omega 3 fatty acid supplementation with or without vitamin D reduced the autoimmune disease rate by 15% (not statistically significant)”.
There are two endpoints measured, and you chose to quote the statistically insignificant result, rather than the significant one. Though I agree, p-hacking is always an issue. OTOH, plenty of biological discoveries come from unintended observations. As long as they replicate, nothing's off limits -- you wouldn't disbelieve penicillin because it wasn't discovered in a pre-registered trial.
> If vitamin D reduced autoimmune diseases you would expect omega 3 + vitamin D to have similar results than just vitamin D
It did. D only hazard ratio: .68, D+omega3 hazard ratio .69
There are two endpoints measured, and you chose to quote the statistically insignificant result, rather than the significant one. Though I agree, p-hacking is always an issue. OTOH, plenty of biological discoveries come from unintended observations. As long as they replicate, nothing's off limits -- you wouldn't disbelieve penicillin because it wasn't discovered in a pre-registered trial.
> If vitamin D reduced autoimmune diseases you would expect omega 3 + vitamin D to have similar results than just vitamin D
It did. D only hazard ratio: .68, D+omega3 hazard ratio .69