Chapter 7 - Conclusion

I tried to write the guide that I wish I’d had when I was a Master’s student trying to program my first model. Most guides I’ve read don’t do a particularly good job of bridging the gap between theory and practice. I hope that this help make the prospect of building a model seem less intimidating.

I couldn’t have done this without some crucial help from Dr. Karissa Johnston, who taught me the basics of using R for this kind of work. Stavros Korokithakis was a constant source of invaluable insight and offered many vital suggestions during the many times I got stuck. My colleagues at the Canadian Centre for Applied Research in Cancer Control, particularly co-director Dr. Stuart Peacock, have also given me many years of support, encouragement, and feedback, and I want to thank them as well.

If you’ve found this guide helpful, or if there’s anything that you think is incorrect or confusing, please feel free to drop me a line and/or find me on Twitter. If you think the effort that went into this guide is worth a few bucks, you can e-transfer to that address, or I have an online tip jar set up. Once again, if you end up publishing a model based on this code somewhere, I’d very much appreciate it if you’d let me know and throw my name into the acknowledgments section, but that’s a request; not a requirement.

Thanks for reading, and happy modeling!

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