Choices: making informed choices

Know Your Chances

This book has been shown in two randomized trials to improve peoples' understanding of risk in the context of health care choices.

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McMaster Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Workshop Resources – Therapy module

This is the therapy module resources provided to the attendees at the McMaster Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Workshop.

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McMaster Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Workshop Resources – Systematic review module

The Systematic review module resources provided to the attendees at the McMaster Evidence-Based Clinical Practice Workshop.

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Tips for learners of evidence-based medicine: 1. relative risk reduction, absolute risk reductions and number needed to treat

Relative risk reduction, absolute risk reduction and number needed to treat.

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Tips for teachers of evidence-based medicine: Relative risk reduction, absolute risk reduction and numbers needed to treat

Tips for teachers of evidence-based medicine: 1. Relative risk reduction, absolute risk reduction and number needed to treat.

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The 2011 Oxford CEBM Levels of Evidence: Introductory Document

The 2011 Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine’s Levels of Evidence.

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Critical Appraisal of Research Evidence 101

Ontario Public Health Libraries Association guide to critical appraisal of research evidence.

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Policy: twenty tips for interpreting scientific claims

This list will help non-scientists to interrogate advisers and to grasp the limitations of evidence.

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Understanding Health Research: A tool for making sense of health studies

An interactive online tool designed to help anybody to understand scientific health research evidence.

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Ice bucket challenge “breakthrough”? Experts pour cold water on superficial reporting

Beware claims of treatment breakthrough. They’re probably not.

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The Slippery Slope: Is a Surrogate Endpoint Evidence of Efficacy?

A discussion of the dangers of relying on surrogate outcome measures.

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University of Western Australia: Bias Minimisation, randomisation and blinding

University of Western Australia’s explanation of why random allocation to comparison groups and blinding (if possible) are important.

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Is the therapy clinically useful?

An article from the PEDro database on whether a treatment is useful.

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Evidence-Based medicine in Pharmacy Practice

An article by Suzanne Albrecht on Evidence-Based Medicine in Pharmacy Practice.

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Goals and tools in Meta-analysis

Meta-analysis in Michigan State University’s Evidence-Based Medicine Course.

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Goals and tools in Prognosis evaluation

How to assess prognosis in Michigan State University’s Evidence-Based Medicine Course.

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Evaluating relevance

How to evaluate relevance of research in Michigan State University’s Evidence-Based Medicine Course.

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Limitations of current clinical practice

Discussion of the need to recognise the limitations of current clinical practice in Michigan State Univ’s Evidence-Based Medicine Course.

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Evidence-based medicine

The European Patients’ Academy web-based introductory course on Evidence-Based Medicine.

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Common pitfalls with studies and things to look out for

‘Ask for Evidence’ introduction to the need for critical appraisal of research studies.

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Animal Studies

‘Ask for Evidence’ information about the relevance and limitations of animal studies for promoting human health.

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‘In vitro’ (e.g. test tube) studies

‘Ask for Evidence’ explanation of the term ‘in vitro’ research.

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Apply the results to your patients

A Duke Univ. tutorial explaining how to address the question: how relevant is the research evidence to the needs of my patient?

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Delfini: Critical appraisal matters

A 20-minute slide cast discussing how reliable evidence and critical appraisal can help to improve health outcomes.

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Sunn Skepsis

Denne portalen er ment å gi deg som pasient råd om kvalitetskriterier for helseinformasjon og tilgang til forskningsbasert informasjon.

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Julia Belluz – Lessons from the trenches of evidence-based health journalism at Vox.com

20-minute talk by Julia Belluz on the need to bring the cultures of health journalism and EBM together.

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Battling bad science

15-min talk by Ben Goldacre on ways evidence can be distorted.

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English National Curriculum vs Key Concepts – Key Stage 3

A linked spreadsheet showing how the Key Concepts map to the Science National Curriculum in England at Key Stage 3 (ages 11-14).

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The surrogate battle – is lower always better?

James McCormick recruits a furious Fuhrer to point out that taking drugs to lower surrogate measures of ill health is a confidence trick.

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Teach Yourself Cochrane

Tells the story behind Cochrane and the challenges finding good quality evidence to produce reliable systematic reviews.

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Building evidence into education

Ben Goldacre explains why appropriate infrastructure is need to do clinical trials of sufficient rigour and size to yield reliable results.

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Anecdotes are great – if they convey data accurately

Ben Goldacre gives examples of how conclusions based on anecdotes and biased research can be damagingly misleading.

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Unsubstantiated and overstated claims of efficacy

A 32-slide presentation on misleading advertisements and FDA warnings prepared by PharmedOut.

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Introduction to Evidence-Based Medicine

Bill Caley’s 26 slides with notes used as an ‘Introduction to Evidence-Based Medicine’.

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Applying evidence to patients

A 27-minute talk on ‘Applying Evidence to Patients’, illustrated by 17 slides, with notes.

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Defining clinical questions

An 8-min talk on ‘Defining Clinical Questions’ illustrated by 10 slides, with notes.

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Applying the evidence

Six key slides produced by the University of Western Australia on applying evidence in practice.

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Appraising the evidence

Six key slides produced by the University of Western Australia to introduce critical appraisal.

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Not all scientific studies are created equally

David Schwartz dissects two types of studies that scientists use, illuminating why you should always approach claims with a critical eye.

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Applying the results of trials and systematic reviews to individual patients

Paul Glasziou uses 28 slides to address ‘Applying the results of trials and systematic reviews to individual patients’.

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Making the most of the evidence in education

A pamphlet to guide people using research evidence when deliberating about educational policies.

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Tipsheet for reporting on drugs, devices and medical technologies

Questions that will be familiar to reporters covering health and medicine.

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Tips for understanding Non-inferiority Trials

A non-inferiority experiment endeavours to show that a new intervention is ‘not unacceptably worse’ than the comparison intervention.

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GenerationR – The importance of involving children and young people in research

3/3, 22-min video at the launch of GenerationR, a network of young people who advise researchers.

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Generation R – The need to reduce waste in clinical research involving children

1/3, 14-min video at the launch of GenerationR, a network of young people who advise researchers.

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Preclinical animal studies: bad experiments cost lives

This blog notes that few therapies that treat disease in animals successfully translate into effective treatments for humans.

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Surrogate Endpoints in EBM: What are the benefits and dangers?

What are surrogate outcomes, their pros and cons, and why you should be cautious in extrapolating from them to clinical decisions.

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Balancing Benefits and harms

A blog explaining what is meant by ‘benefits’ and ‘harms’ in the context of healthcare interventions, and the importance of balancing them.

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Surrogate endpoints: pitfalls of easier questions

A blog explaining what surrogate endpoints are and why they should be interpreted cautiously.

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Making sense of randomized trials

A description of how clinical trials are constructed and analysed to ensure they provide fair comparisons of treatments.

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Making sense of results – CASP

This module introduces the key concepts required to make sense of statistical information presented in research papers.

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Toma de Decisiones Compartidas

¿Por qué nosotros, los pacientes, debemos participar en la toma de decisiones médicas importantes?

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Using the results of up-to-date systematic reviews of research

Trustworthy evidence from research is necessary, but not sufficient, to improve the quality of health care.

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Surrogate markers may not tell the whole story

A webpage explaining the limitations of using surrogate outcome markers in clinical research.

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Testing Treatments

Testing Treatments is a book to help the public understand why fair tests of treatments are needed, what they are, and how to use them.

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Effectiveness Delusions

Cherry picking the results of people in sub-groups can be misleading.

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Cecil and those pellets again…

If possible, participants in clinical trials should not know which treatment they are receiving.

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Catch 22 – clinical trials edition

Fair comparisons of treatments in animals or highly selected groups of people may not be relevant.

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Composite Outcomes

Fair comparisons of treatments should measure important outcomes and avoid dependence on surrogate outcome measures.

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Biomarkers unlimited

Fair comparisons of treatments should measure important outcomes and avoid dependence on surrogate outcome measures.

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Does it work?

People with vested interests may use misleading statistics to support claims about the efects of new treatments.

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Introduction to clinical trials: lay-friendly video

This lay-friendly video introduction to clinical trials was created by the European Communication on Research Awareness Needs Project.

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Testing Treatments Audio Book

The Testing Treatments Audiobook enables visitors to the TTi site to select whichever chapters in the book they would like to listen to.

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Methodology of clinical trials

Eurordis training on the methodology of clinical trials for representatives of patients’ organisations.

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How to read articles about healthcare

This article 'How to read health news behind the headlines', by Dr Alicia White, explains how to assess health claims in the media.

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Can measurements show if a treatment works?

An article discussing errors to avoid when testing treatments.

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Animal and Lab studies

A webpage explaining how results from animal studies may not be transferable to humans.

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Be careful with composites

Kevin Lomangino's article discusses the limitations of composite outcomes and surrogate markers.

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Disease outcomes vs. patient-relevant outcomes

An e-Learning module consisting of 3 slides and 2-min commentary on why it is important to treat patients, not numbers from tests.

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Viva la Evidence!

A brilliant song and video by James McCormack explaining the basics of evidence-based medicine.

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Evidence Based Medicine Matters: Examples of where EBM has benefitted patients

Booklet containing 15 examples submitted by Royal Colleges where Evidence-Based Medicine has benefited clinical practice.

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Some Studies That I Like to Quote

This short music video encourages health professionals to use evidence to help reach treatment decisions in partnership with patients.

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Shared Decision-Making

This resource from the Health Foundation shows how shared decision-making can be made to work in a typical consultation.

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On taking a good look at ourselves

Iain Chalmers talks about failings in scientific research that lead to avoidable harm to patients and waste of resources.

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Communicating with patients on evidence

This discussion paper from the US Institute of Medicine provides guidance on communicating evidence to patients.

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Involving citizens to improve healthcare

‘The confluence of interest between advocacy groups, those who sell treatments, and those who prescribe them makes for a potent […]

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Lay people help to rethink AIDS

‘Credibility struggles in the AIDS arena have been multilateral: they have involved an unusually wide range of players. And the […]

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A key partnership

‘People-focused research in the NHS simply cannot be delivered without the involvement of patients and the public. No matter how […]

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Patients’ choice: David and Goliath

‘Who has the power to see that research questions actually address the greatest needs of patients in all their misery […]

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Psoriasis patients poorly served by research

‘Few trials involved comparison of different options or looked at long-term management. The duration of studies is unconvincingly brief in […]

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Who decides what gets studied?

Clearly this situation is unsatisfactory, so how has it come about? One reason is that what gets studied by researchers […]

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Questions that are important for patients

Researchers in Bristol decided to pose a fundamental question:  ‘To what extent are questions of importance to patients with osteoarthritis […]

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Stroke

Another example of unnecessary research, yet again because the results of preceding studies had not been gathered together and analyzed, […]

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Epidural analgesia for women in labour

The importance of assessing outcomes that matter to patients is clearly illustrated – in a very negative fashion – by […]

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What research regulation should do

‘If ethicists and others want something to criticise in clinical trials, they should look at scientifically inadequate work, reinvention of […]

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A commonsense approach to informed consent in good medical practice

‘What is missing in the debate surrounding informed consent is the true nature of patient understanding, what information patients want […]

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Rethinking informed consent

‘[Some] have come to suspect that informed consent is not fundamental to good biomedical practice, and . . . attempts […]

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What regulatory systems do not do

Although regulatory systems for research impose onerous requirements on researchers before studies start, there are many things they conspicuously fail […]

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Information and consent

Requirements relating to provision of information and consent for studies are one of the ways in which the regulatory system […]

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What does “statistically significant” mean?

‘To be honest, it’s a tricky idea. It can tell us if the difference between a drug and a placebo […]

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What does a “significant difference” between treatments mean?

Well, this is a trick question, because ‘significant difference’ can have several meanings. First, it can mean a difference that […]

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Addressing uncertainties about the effects of treatments

Where do we go from here? Clinicians need to be able to draw on resources that provide the best current […]

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When practitioners disagree

In this sub-section Introduction (this page) Caffeine for breathing problems in premature babies Antibiotics in pre-term labour Breast cancer Introduction […]

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Herceptin

Commercial companies are not alone in trumpeting the advantages of new treatments while down-playing drawbacks. Professional hype and enthusiastic media […]

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