Quick start guide

System requirements

To run the MedCalc program you need a PC with Windows 2000, Windows XP, Vista or Windows 7, with at least 128 MB RAM and about 8 Megabyte free space on the hard disk.

Software installation

• If you have downloaded the software from the Internet, you should locate the setup file medcalcsetup.exe on your hard disk and execute (double-click) it.
• If you have a program CD, locate the setup file medcalcsetup.exe on the CD and execute it.
• This installation procedure will create a directory named MedCalc (or another directory you have selected during the installation procedure) on your hard disk, and copy the program files to this directory. In addition, it will create a sub-directory for the program's data files.
• When installation is complete, you start MedCalc by clicking the Start button and point to Programs, next click MedCalc.

Note: To setup MedCalc you must be logged on to your computer with administrator privileges.

Trial period

As long as you have not purchased a MedCalc license, and entered the product key in the software, the software runs in 'trial mode'.

The MedCalc free trial has the following limitations:

• the data you enter cannot be saved;
• the spreadsheet is limited to 200 rows;
• you cannot export or save graphs;
• the program can be used 30 times without registration.

After this trial period you should purchase a MedCalc license so you can continue to use the software.

Sample data

After installation of the software, you will find some MedCalc sample data files in a MedCalc subdirectory of your "My Documents" folder.

The spreadsheet data window

In MedCalc data are entered in a spreadsheet. You can open the spreadsheet by selecting Spreadsheet in the View menu.

How to perform statistical analyses

In order to load a data file from disk, select the command Open in the File menu. Next, select the name of the file in the File selector panel. For example, you can select the data file EXAMPLE.MC1. This file contains data on length and weight for a number of persons.

When you want to obtain summary statistics for the variable Weight, select Summary statistics in the Statistics menu. The following dialog panel appears on the screen:

In this dialog panel you can identify the variable to be analyzed. You can click the button to obtain a list of variables.

From this list you can select a variable by clicking the variable’s name:

If the variable requires a logarithmic or square root, or any other mathematical transformation, then you can enter a formula in the variable field:

SQRT(WEIGHT)
LOG(LENGTH)

or you can enter a formula combining different variables, e.g.

WEIGHT/LENGTH

Optionally, you may also enter a selection criterion in the Select field of the dialog panel, in order to include only particular cases in the statistical analysis.

The Select field may contain a combination of different criteria, using the AND and OR functions, e.g.

AND(LENGTH>160,LENGTH<170)

When you have entered a selection criterion in a dialog panel, this selection criterion will be ‘remembered’ by the program and will be selectable in the Select list.

Click OK to obtain the following results:

ROC curve analysis

See the ROC curve analysis section of the MedCalc manual.

More ...

See the complete MedCalc online manual