Research topics

Question 1

What is a cohort study?

Answer 1

Cases are separated into study and control groups before the investigator is aware of whether the patients have or will develop the condition being studied .

Question 2

What is a case-control study?

Answer 2

Cases have already developed the disease, and the controls are those that have not.

Question 3

What is the statistical effect of not double-blinding a trial?

Answer 3

Results larger by 17%

Achultz KF, Chalmers I, Hayes RJ. Altman DG. Empirical evidence if bias: dimensions of methodological quality associated with estimates of treatment effects in controlled tries. JAMA. 1995; 273:408-412

Question 4

What are the four steps of the application of evidence-based medicine model?

Answer 4

Ask
Acquire (data)
Appraise
Apply

The practice of EBM is based on a framework of four steps: Ask a well-constructed question and then Acquire, Appraise and Apply information to answer the question. Critical appraisal of evidence is the process of systematically examining research to assess its validity (degree to which the results of the study are likely to be true, believable and free from bias) and relevance (importance to your patients, generalizability) before using it to make a clinical decision.

Source: AO PEER

Question 5

What does the acronym PICOT stand for in regards to formulating a research question?

Answer 5

P: Population
I: Intervention
C: Comparison
O: Outcome
T: Time

The PICOT format is a helpful approach for summarizing research questions that explore the effect of therapy:

(P) – Population refers to the sample of subjects you wish to recruit for your study. There may be a fine balance between defining a sample that is most likely to respond to your intervention (e.g. no co-morbidity) and one that can be generalized to patients that are likely to be seen in actual practice.
(I) – Intervention refers to the treatment that will be provided to subjects enrolled in your study.
(C) – Comparison identifies what you plan on using as a reference group to compare with your treatment intervention. Many study designs refer to this as the control group. If an existing treatment is considered the ‘gold standard’, then this should be the comparison group.
(O) – Outcome represents what result you plan on measuring to examine the effectiveness of your intervention. Familiar and validated outcome measurement tools relevant to common chiropractic patient populations may include the Neck Disability Index or Roland-Morris Questionnaire. There are, typically, a multitude of outcome tools available for different clinical populations, each having strengths and weaknesses.
(T) – Time describes the duration for your data collection.
Guyatt G, Drummond R, Meade M, Cook D. The Evidence Based-Medicine Working Group Users’ Guides to the Medical Literature. 2nd edition. McGraw Hill; Chicago: 2008.