Re: st: Plotting string variables with sencode

[Roger Newson <roger.newson@kcl.ac.uk>]

At 11:12 06/10/2005, Joanna Carrington wrote:
> Dear Stata list users,
>
> I am trying to produce a graph that is essentially a forest plot using a 
> combination of a scatter plot and a twoway rcap plot.  I have gone down 
> this route as I have found the metagraph and eclplots are not exactly what 
> I need.  I have estimates with very different weights and those that are 
> weighted heavily completely engulf the other lightly weighted estimates 
> when metagraph is used (I have tried changing the scale of the weights in 
> the plot and this doesn't help as the smaller weights disappear).  The 
> [w="a weight"] option does not work with the eclplot command.
>
> So using the my scatter and rcap plot I need to plot the alphanumerical id 
> of the estimates on the y axis.  I have used sencode to produce a new 
> variable that, if I'm correct in thinking, is numerical but keeps the 
> alphanumerical part as a label.  Now when I use this variable in the plots 
> I would like the labels to be displayed (automatically preferably to me 
> specifying each individual label using ylabel(1 "" 2 etc)) rather than the 
> number.
> Does anyone know how I can do this please?
If you use the option

ylabel(1(1)20, valuelabel)

then the axis labels will be value labels. Otherwise, the axis labels may 
be value labels or formatted values, depending on the scheme.

Another tip. -eclplot- can do symbols weighted by study size. It does this 
by specifying weights as part of the -estopts()- option. If you type

eclplot estimate min95 max95 study, estopts(,[aweight=studysize])

(note the comma before the weight), then the estimates will be weighted by 
study size. And you can also use the -supby()-, -estopts1()- and 
-estopts2()- options to make the symbols squares for the individual studies 
and diamonds for the combined meta-analysed estimates. See the on-line help 
for -eclplot-.

I hope this helps.

Roger



--
Roger Newson
Lecturer in Medical Statistics
Department of Public Health Sciences
Division of Asthma, Allergy and Lung Biology
King's College London

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Tel: 020 7848 6648 International +44 20 7848 6648
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Email: roger.newson@kcl.ac.uk
Website: http://phs.kcl.ac.uk/rogernewson/

Opinions expressed are those of the author, not the institution.

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