[BostonCard]

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanet...le/2788852

I hope you will forgive the brief incursion into COVID, but this is more about Jerome’s contribution to the medical literature, which is awesome to say.  Along with four colleagues in the department of orthopedic surgery, the team showed that participation in NCAA sports was not associated with increased test positivity compared to other students. Ironically Stanford was the only school where athletes had a higher positivity rate than non-athletes, but the positivity rates of both were among the lowest in the country (only Arkansas had a lower positivity rate among athletes, and no school had a lower positivity rate among non-athletes).

Anyway, great to see our student athletes involved in clinical research.  Any idea on Jerome’s future plans?

BC

[BostonCard]

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanet...le/2788852

I hope you will forgive the brief incursion into COVID, but this is more about Jerome’s contribution to the medical literature, which is awesome to say.  Along with four colleagues in the department of orthopedic surgery, the team showed that participation in NCAA sports was not associated with increased test positivity compared to other students. Ironically Stanford was the only school where athletes had a higher positivity rate than non-athletes, but the positivity rates of both were among the lowest in the country (only Arkansas had a lower positivity rate among athletes, and no school had a lower positivity rate among non-athletes).

Anyway, great to see our student athletes involved in clinical research.  Any idea on Jerome’s future plans?

BC

[Jamesy]

Lead author is a softball player!

[Jamesy]

Lead author is a softball player!

[BostonCard]

Thanks Jamesy!  I recognized Jerome’s name but I’m not as familiar with Schultz. I edited the subject… but not the body. Nonetheless, anything I wrote about Jerome also applies to Schultz, including the question of her after-Stanford plans.

One last thing; I get a weekly digest from JAMA on their COVID-19 papers. I flagged this one to read because I thought it was interesting, and only after did I note the author(s).

BC

[BostonCard]

Thanks Jamesy!  I recognized Jerome’s name but I’m not as familiar with Schultz. I edited the subject… but not the body. Nonetheless, anything I wrote about Jerome also applies to Schultz, including the question of her after-Stanford plans.

One last thing; I get a weekly digest from JAMA on their COVID-19 papers. I flagged this one to read because I thought it was interesting, and only after did I note the author(s).

BC

[BobK]

Schultz is our First Base. She wants to be a Dr

[BobK]

Schultz is our First Base. She wants to be a Dr

[chimera]

Very cool.  Congrats to the Jerome.

[chimera]

Very cool.  Congrats to the Jerome.

[old spanish trail]

Agree. So cool. I think I remember seeing that Jerome was in Human Biology and wanted to be a doc. Maybe, she's moving toward Public Health.

[old spanish trail]

Agree. So cool. I think I remember seeing that Jerome was in Human Biology and wanted to be a doc. Maybe, she's moving toward Public Health.

[PVTree]

Schultz is our First Base. She wants to be a Dr

Are you saying "ScWHOultz on First." Then, Whats on second? :)

[PVTree]

Schultz is our First Base. She wants to be a Dr

Are you saying "ScWHOultz on First." Then, Whats on second? :)

[M T]

It is good that they went through the process of submitting the paper, presumably as part of the education process.

I find it disappointing that JAMA accepted it.  The better lesson for the student-authors would have been to reject it.

In my opinion, their data are meaningless because the numbers used (tests) are inequal for the different groups per person.  There was no attempt to quantify or adjust for that.  While their Results section is primarily about all 12 schools  with patently unequal tests per capita in the two populations, they seem to try to want the reader to believe that for 4 schools this isn't the case ("to mitigate the differences in testing frequency"),  but again they fail to indicate even whether or not the testing frequency corresponds between athletes and non-athletes.  Nowhere do they give absolute numbers of the athletes, non-athletes, or infections in either group.   I found their Limitations section to inadequately point this out.  It would have been useful to indicate how the rate of infections (not test positivity rate) of the athletes or non-athletes compared to the various communities.

The conclusion "This study found that varsity collegiate student athletes did not have increased risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection compared with nonathlete students" is totally unsupported.  At best, all they can say is that the percent of tests with positive results for athletes is overall less than for nonathletes (Fig 2 is "Student Athlete Test Positivity Relative Risk").  They make no argument that the difference in percent positive tests corresponds to a relative risk of infection.

They might have data there (if they can get the size of the populations) that says more testing per-capita results in a lower percent positive.  (But that's obvious, I hope!)

[M T]

It is good that they went through the process of submitting the paper, presumably as part of the education process.

I find it disappointing that JAMA accepted it.  The better lesson for the student-authors would have been to reject it.

In my opinion, their data are meaningless because the numbers used (tests) are inequal for the different groups per person.  There was no attempt to quantify or adjust for that.  While their Results section is primarily about all 12 schools  with patently unequal tests per capita in the two populations, they seem to try to want the reader to believe that for 4 schools this isn't the case ("to mitigate the differences in testing frequency"),  but again they fail to indicate even whether or not the testing frequency corresponds between athletes and non-athletes.  Nowhere do they give absolute numbers of the athletes, non-athletes, or infections in either group.   I found their Limitations section to inadequately point this out.  It would have been useful to indicate how the rate of infections (not test positivity rate) of the athletes or non-athletes compared to the various communities.

The conclusion "This study found that varsity collegiate student athletes did not have increased risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection compared with nonathlete students" is totally unsupported.  At best, all they can say is that the percent of tests with positive results for athletes is overall less than for nonathletes (Fig 2 is "Student Athlete Test Positivity Relative Risk").  They make no argument that the difference in percent positive tests corresponds to a relative risk of infection.

They might have data there (if they can get the size of the populations) that says more testing per-capita results in a lower percent positive.  (But that's obvious, I hope!)