evidence based medicine Flashcards
what is a critical appraisal?
process of carefully + systematically examining research to judge its trustworthiness + value + relevance in a particular context
why do a critical appraisal?
interpreting conflicting conclusion to obtain consensus
ultimately to inform guideline - SIGN
translation research into “real-life” clinical medicine
examples of experimental studies
systematic reviews (combining RCTs)
randomised control trials (RCTs)
examples of observational analytical
cohort - prospective, retrospective
case-control
cross-sectional study
examples of observational descriptive studies
case reports + case series
-> a report on a series of patients with an outcome of interest, no control group is used
what are the 2 types of randomised control trials?
intention to treat RTCs - analysed in randomised group
per-protocol RTCs -analysed in treatment group
difference between prospective + retrospective cohort studies?
prospective - cohort followed forward in time from present
retrospective - cohort formed in the past + followed up to the present
case-control study
begin with the outcomes and do not follow people over time; researchers choose people with a particular result (the cases) and interview the groups or check their records to ascertain what different experiences they had
(observational analytical)
presentation of results of critical appraisal
- Results are assessed using statistical inference testing
- Test used depends on type of data; compare means with t-test, compare proportions with Chi-squared test
- Results declared as a difference between groups with a 95%
confidence interval - accept or reject the null hypothesis
cross-sectional study
the observation of a defined population at a single point in time or time interval; exposure and outcome are determined simultaneously
- Interview a fresh sample of people each time they are carried out
- Vs a longuitudinal study - same sample of people over time
(observational analytical)
