Statistics and Evidence (yellow) Flashcards
1
Q
- what is evidence?
- what is decision making?
- how are medical decisions uncertain? (4)
- how is evidence used in medical decision making?
- name 4 examples of evidence sources
A
- an observation, fact, or organised body of information, offered to support or justify inferences or beliefs in the demonstration of some preposition or matter at issue
- a choice of action
- different people act differently to the same decision
- there may be insufficient information to assist with accurate diagnosis or estimation of treatment effects
- you may not know what the patient wants
- it may be difficult to apply available knowledge to a specific patient
- different people act differently to the same decision
- as a way of reducing uncertainty
- personal experience; experience of others; views of “experts”; information from books or journals
2
Q
- what sources are made when making a clinical decision (4)
- why is evidence based decision making important? (6)
- how is evidence based decision making implemented?
A
- patient preferences; available resources; research evidence; clinical expertise
- deals with uncertainty
- medical knowledge is incomplete/changing
- patients will receive the most appropriate treatment
- constant need for innovation and improvement
- improving efficiency of healthcare services
- reduces practice variation
- deals with uncertainty
- evidence based clinical guidelines
summaries of evidence provided to practicioners
access to reviews of research evidence
practitioners evaluating research for themselves.
3
Q
- define diagnosis
- define prognosis
- name and describe the 3 theories of decision making
A
- the process of determining the nature of a disorder by considering the patient’s signs, symptoms, medical background and test results
- assessment of future course and outcome of a patient’s disease
- normative - what should you be doing according to social or professional norms
descriptive - what are you doing?
prescriptive - how can we improve what we are doing?
4
Q
- describe the 4 components of the hypothetico-deductive model of diagnostic reasoning
- who uses this model of diagnostic reasoning?
- describe the prospect theory of diagnostic reasoning
- who uses this model?
A
- cue acquisition. hypothesis formation. cue interpretation. hypothesis evaluation
- unexperienced clinicians and experienced clinicians with a less familiar diagnostic problem
- framing and editing - preliminary analysis of decision problem
phase of evaluation - framed prospects are evaluated and the prospect with the highest value selected - experienced clinicians
5
Q
- what is broad evidence?
- what is narrow evidence?
- what is the heirarchy of evidence?
- what increases going up the pyramid?
- why should the heirarchy be used critically (3)
- where can good evidence be found?
- what is bias?
A
- any factor that can and should influence clinical decision making
- results of rigorous clinical trials and observational studies
- lists the type of study design ranked in order of their perceived ability to provide evidence for use in practice.
- less potential for bias therefore more predictive power
- study designs are suited to answering different research questions
there are good and bad studies of any type
the pyramid does not include qualitative research - cochrane database
evidence based journals
medline - systematic error in measurement
6
Q
- what is interval data?
- what is ordinal data?
- what is nominal data?
- what is descriptive statistical analysis?
- what is correlational statistical analysis?
- what is inferential statistical analysis?
- which 2 of the above can test for significance?
A
- quantitative, discrete data, where only certain values are possible (e.g number of admittances to hospital) or continuous, where any value is possible (e.g. age, weight)
- qualitative, but ordered where there are more than 2 categories that have logical order (e.g. service satisfaction rated, poor, good, excellent etc)
- qualitative, multinominal, with more than 2 categories which are not ordered (e.g. single, married, divorced, widowed etc)
- organising, summarising, and describing data (mean, SD etc)
- examining relationships between data
- using stats tests to make generalisations about a population
- correlational and inferential
7
Q
- what percentage of data is expected to be found within 1SD of the mean?
- what percentage of data is expected yo be found within 2SD of the mean?
- describe a negative skew
- describe a positive skew
- name 3 measures of location
- name 3 measures of dispersion
A
- 68%
- 95%
- peak found to the right. mode>median>mean
- peak found to the left. mode
8
Q
- what does a probability of 1 suggest?
- what does a probability of 0 suggest?
- what does a null hypothesis state?
- what does an alternate hypothesis state?
- what P value usually indicates statistical significance? What does this mean?
A
- certain to happen
- certain not to happen
- that there is no difference/any difference observed is due to chance
- that there is a difference/difference seen is due to manipulation
- 0.05
9
Q
what is the difference between statistical significance and clinical significance?
A
statistical significance states that there is a difference
clinical significance questions whether this difference is worth it
- yes it improves life expectancy but how much by
10
Q
- how do you calculate standard deviation?
- what is standard error?
- how do you calculate standard error?
A
- √(∑(x-x̄)2/(n-1) where x = each value, x̄ is the mean value of the sample, and n = number of samples
- while standard deviation is a measure of spread, standard error is the measure of accuracy
- describes how good a given estimate is
- tells you how good your sample statistic is
- looks at how accurate estimate of the mean is - standard deviation/√(n)
11
Q
- describe 3 types of descriptive research
2. describe 2 types of analytic research
A
1. survey case report case series 2. experiment observation - cohort study. case controlled study
12
Q
- what is an experiment?
- what is an observation?
- what is a cohort study?
- what is a case control study?
- what is a historical cohort study?
A
- interventions are assigned by the investigator (usually at random); if groups differ in terms of the intervention, then changes observed are a measure of the intervention. Provides powerful evidence about cause and effect.
- no intervention by investigator. Analysis of spontaneously occurring events; group assignments are not random.
- type of observational study. Subjects with a certain exposure are followed over time for outcome occurance
- looks back to understand risk factors that lead to a particular disease (start with outcome; look back at exposures)
- using information collected in the past and looking at outcomes.
13
Q
- what is risk?
- how can risk be quantified?
- what are odds?
- how can be odds be quantified?
- how do we calculate risk?
- how do we calculate risk difference?
- how do we calculate risk ratio?
- how do we calculate odds ratio?
- what is relative risk?
- what are relative measures of risk?
- what is absolute risk?
- what are absolute measures of risk?
A
- the probability that an event will occur during a specified time
- natural frequency (1 in 85)
probability (1/85 = 0.012)
percentage (1.2%) - the ratio of probability that something will happen to the probability that it won’t
- 1/85 / 84/85
- number of people who get thing/number in group
USING RISK OF CERVICAL CANCER IN THE PRESENCE OR ABSENCE OF ORAL CONTRACEPTIVE PILL AS EXAMPLE:
- risk with pill - risk without pill
- risk with pill / risk without pill
- odds with pill / odds without pill
- risk that is relative to a reference group (only makes sense if we know what it is relative to)
- risk and odds ratios
- risk that can be interpreted without a reference group
- risk and odds themselves, and risk differences
14
Q
- what is incidence?
- What is prevalence?
- How do we calculate incidence?
- How do we calculate prevalence?
A
- the measure of probability of occurrence of a medical condition within a specified period of time
- the proportion of disease found to be affecting a particular population
- number of new cases in a disease period/number of initially free cases
- number of people with a disease at a particular point/total population
15
Q
- what is a clinical trial?
- Describe the following stages of clinical trials:
a) Phase I
b) phase II
c) phase III
d) phase IV - What is a randomised controlled trial?
A
- a planned experiment involving patients, designed to determine the most appropriate treatment of future patients with a given medication
2a) dose finding, safety and side effect. Carried out on healthy volunteers
2b) initial investigation for efficacy. Carried out with patients
2c) full scale evaluation - randomised and controlled
2d) post marketing surveillance - an experiment in which consentong patients are randomly allocated into groups