C1 - Flashcards
What is double clinical trial?
Where neither the researchers nor participants know who is receiving the real drug or the placebo
What an advantage of double clinical trials?
It eliminates bias which gives more accurate results which increases validity
What are the problems of double clinical trials?
- Expensive to create placebo
- Bad reaction
What is a placebo trial?
Where some patients receive a placebo which is a chemically inactive drug which looks like the real drug with no side effects
What are the advantages of placebo trials?
- Allows researchers to determine side effects of a particular drug
- Minimises bias
What are the problems of placebo trials?
- Undermines trust
- Medical harm
- High cost
- Lower reliability
What is an epidemiology?
The study of how often diseases occur in different groups of people and why. Information about the diet, race and gender can be gathered
What are the 3 ways to ensure your clinical trial is fair and reliable?
- Using control groups - participants are randomly allocated to either a group where treatment is being tested or the groups with where a placebo is given
- Sample must be large enough to be certain the results are not by chance
- Using placebos eliminates psychological bias
What does prevalence mean?
A measure of the frequency of diseases in a population at a particular point e.g. 500 people in a town, 50 have diabetes so the prevalence of diabetes would be 10%
What does incidence mean?
The number of new cases in a particular time period e.g. within a year 10 new cases of diabetes are diagnosed in the same town
What does morality mean?
A measure of the number of death, this is collected from death registrations and shows cause of death
What does morbidity mean?
The rate of disease which is collected from gps, household surveys or hospitals
