Variable properties

In this dialog box you can define the variable properties (formula, variable label and value labels).

More on MedCalc variables.

To obtain this dialog box, click Edit variables list on the Tools menu, and next select the variable you wish you modify and click Properties.

Variable

First the variable is displayed, or the formula in case of a derived variable. E.g. if you have a variable named HEIGHT containing the height of patients in meters, and you have another variable WEIGHT containing the weight of patients in kilograms, then you can complete the dialog box as follows to obtain a new variable containing the Body Mass Index.

Weight/Power(Height,2)

Click fx to call the Variable formula editor for easy editing of the formula.

Label

Next you can give a descriptive label to the variable. This label will be displayed in reports and graphs.

For example:

Body Mass Index

Categorical variable

Click the corresponding option when the variable is categorical. Optionally, you can select a reference category (used in Logistic regression and Cox proportional-hazards regression.

If you do not select a reference category, MedCalc will - when needed - use the category with most observations as the reference category.

Value labels

You can assign labels to particular values of the variable. These labels will be used for example to identify subgroups in graphs.

Click in the cells in the columns "Value" and "Label" to start to enter data and labels.

Click the Up and Down arrow buttons to move selected rows up or down.

Click Scan data to scan the data and to populate the list with existing values.

You can also delete selected rows from the list by clicking the Delete button.

See also

• How to define and use labels for the different categories of a variable
• Variables
• Operators
• Spreadsheet overview