Advice for new Stata user and statistics novice

[Rozalina McCoy]

Hello everyone!

I am an MD with a lot of interest in health services research, currently mostly secondary data analysis but may ultimately some survey research as well. I am learning statistics now and am a complete Stata (and other statistical program) novice; I am hoping to become proficient enough to do rudimentary work myself and defer the complicated analyses to my statistician colleagues. We rely primarily on linear/logistic regression and survival analyses.

I have a grant with substantial amount of money remaining and about to expire, so I am hoping to use it to buy Stata reference books. Can you recommend good books to get, if money is not an issue?

Some of the books I was thinking of are:
1. "A Gentle Introduction to Stata, Fourth Edition", by Alan C. Acock
2. Either "Speaking Stata Graphics" by Nicholas J. Cox (looked more user friendly) OR "A Visual Guide to Stata Graphics, Third Edition"by Michael N. Mitchell
3. "An Introduction to Stata for Health Researchers, Fourth Edition"
by Svend Juul and Morten Frydenberg
4."An Introduction to Survival Analysis Using Stata, Third Edition"
by Mario Cleves, William Gould, Roberto G. Gutierrez, and Yulia V. Marchenko

I am also open to other recommendations and suggestions. Books can be from the Stata website or elsewhere (no restriction).

Thank you for your help!

[Richard Williams]

I very much like Long & Freese's book on Categorical data analysis: http://www.stata.com/bookstore/regre...les/index.html. However, a new edition is in the works, so if you can hold off a while I would.

There are any number of other good books. It mostly depends on what you are most interested in. You seem to have made good choices so far.

[Richard Williams]

Incidentally, there is all sorts of freebie stuff online. See http://www.stata.com/links/resources...earning-stata/

My own Stata highlights notes, along with links to other stats notes, are at http://www3.nd.edu/~rwilliam/stats/StataHighlights.html

[Philip Jones]

The books you included in your post are good one, and I would recommend them (I own all of them except for "Speaking Stata Graphics"). I would add to the list "Regression Models as a Tool in Medical Research" by Werner Vach, which, given you will be doing lots of regression, I would recommend highly.

http://www.stata.com/bookstore/regre...ical-research/

[Alfonso Sánchez-Peñalver]

Of the books you mention I have an old version of "A Visual Guide to Stata Graphics." by Michael N. Mitchell, and I strongly recommend it. Nick Cox's book is a collection of many of his wonderful columns in the Stata Journal called "Speaking Stata", so you can find many of them available for free to download from the Stata Journal (sorry Nick, didn't want to burst your royalties here ).

I know you said you deal mostly with OLS, logistic and survival, but I'm sure that sooner or later you are going to deal with multilevel models as well, and other things. I have to recommend that you buy Cameron and Trivedi's "Microeconometrics using Stata". It's a book that will take you from the basics of Stata, to understanding many different methods of estimation, as well as give practical examples of how to apply each one of them. Maybe, once you get hooked to Stata with an introductory book, and believe me it is very addictive hehehe, you can give this one a go because I think you won't be disappointed.

Good luck learning Stata and welcome!

[Nick Cox]

If you just lost me a sale, you owe me a drink, and I am visiting Boston real soon now. Insert various smileys exponentiated.

[Clyde Schechter]

Different people have different learning styles, of course. My own experience, when I was starting to use Stata was that the most useful thing was Stata Corp.'s online courses. Over the years, I have referred several of the residents/fellows/students I have mentored to them, and all have been extremely satisfied and come out of them using Stata really well.

[Alan Neustadtl]

I have a series of videos that provide an introduction to statistical programming using Stata at https://www.youtube.com/user/smilex3md. The Stata videos are at the bottom of the screen. I use these videos in a first programming course for graduate students.

Best,
Alan

[Alfonso Sánchez-Peñalver]

lol Nick, I'll buy you a drink when you're over even if you don't lose a sale! Are you coming for the conference? Let me know.

[rogogo]

Addition to the books you metion, the following might be interesting...

[Christophe Kolodziejczyk]

Data Analysis is a good one too. Very complete and teaches some of the complicated Stata stuff which is very useful (i.e. It will save you a lot of time). Can serve as a reference book about Stata. Definitely worth buying. Best Christophe http://www.stata-press.com/books/dat...s-using-stata/

[Rozalina McCoy]

Thank you so much for your advice! I ordered the books and can't wait to get started using Stata. I am sure I will have many more questions in the future!

[Roberto Ferrer]

Rozalina,

When books are concerned, my lemma is "the more the merrier". But no need to wait for your new books to arrive. As already mentioned, there is a lot of free material vaialable in the web, BUT DO NOT FORGET the comprehensive set of documentation bundled with Stata. Tha official manuals are excellent, filled with examples and technical material if you need it. Initiate with [U] User's Guide which is a must when starting with Stata. This particular manual should be read, in my opinion, from head to tail. By the time your new books arrive you'll feel much more comfortable with the material therein presented.