Clinical endpoints of ESLD were verified against

source documents using specific case report forms and reviewed centrally. Case report forms solicited detailed information on means by which diagnoses were obtained (e.g. radiological, endoscopic, electroencephalogram (EEG), laboratory and liver biopsy results) and their associated findings. We employed definitions for diagnoses similar to those described by Lo Re et al. [15] All reported deaths were verified and classified this website following the ‘Coding of Death in HIV’ (CoDe) system (www.cphiv.dk/CoDe/tabid/55/Default.aspx). Each time a participant was reported to have died, sites completed a detailed case report form which included all information related to the death (including death certificate information, autopsy reports if available and clinical diagnoses and events immediately preceding the death, including specific information related to ESLD).

Linkage to provincial vital statistics reports (death certificates) was performed in British Columbia, Alberta and Quebec and used to supplement data obtained in the case report forms and to determine if any participants who had been lost to follow-up had died. Primary and secondary causes of death were collected using International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision (ICD-9) codes. The final determination of cause of death was made independently by two investigators (MBK and MP) and in the cases (n = 2) where there were discrepancies, resolved by a third investigator (JC). We compared baseline characteristics of participants between each province using the Kruskal–Wallis test for continuous http://www.selleckchem.com/products/Gefitinib.html variables and Pearson’s χ2 or Fisher exact test for categorical variables where appropriate. All tests were two-tailed and with a significance level of α = 0.05. We estimated the rate of health outcomes (fibrosis, ESLD, AIDS and all-cause death) since cohort enrolment by dividing the number

of participants developing the event for the first time by the number of person-years at risk. Poisson count models were used to calculate confidence intervals (CIs) for incidence rates. The Kaplan–Meier survival method was used to obtain cumulative incidences of the various health outcomes. Standardized mortality ratios were Thalidomide calculated using the indirect method of standardization by sex and age group for each province; the comparison group was the general population of each province for 2007. Comparative data were obtained through the Canadian Human Mortality Database [16]. Analyses were performed using R program for Windows Release 2.11.1 (R cran, Auckland, New Zealand). A total of 955 participants were enrolled and followed for a median of 1.4 years [interquartile range (IQR) 0.5–2.3 years]; 175 had only one baseline visit, of whom 66 were enrolled within 6 months of the analyses. Of those with more than one visit, 9% were lost to follow-up.