Don Berry, former head of the division of quantitative sciences and chair of the department of biostatistics at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center has a great column in Amstat News discussing collaborations between statisticians and clinicians. There are a few very nice bits, but do read the full column.
The first is
We send clear messages to our clinical collaborators that we are as interested in curing cancer as they are. We work as a team. Even though we have tools, we are not mechanics.
This mindset seems common in cancer centers. The focus on a single disease has a way of bringing people together.
Regarding getting involved in the science:
Our statisticians become specialists in the diseases within which they collaborate….My pet peeve is the statistician who designs a clinical trial by asking for the null rate, clinically important difference, and accrual rate and uses standard software to produce a sample size. Where are the questions about the disease, its standard treatment, its prevalence, and its biology?
