Right to remain anxious

Format: Cartoons

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Language/s: English

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Target Audience: Self-directed learning

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Short Description:

Earlier testing is not always better, and can lead to overdiagnosis, overtreatment and anxiety.

Key Concepts addressed:

• 1-9 Earlier is not necessarily better

Details

Just what the world needs…. another inadequately discoverable journal! The number of medical journals is doubling every 20 years – and trials are scattered across so many, that it is becoming ever harder to track them down. Just how many journals do you need to read?, blogs Paul Glasziou.  Richard Smith and Ian Roberts argue that trials shouldn’t even be published in journals any more.

And in case you were wondering what an n-of-1 trial is: it’s a trial with one person in it (number = 1). It means the patient is their own control in a structured experiment. For example, an “n of 1 trial” of a particular drug would mean taking it for a pre-specified time, stopping for a pre-specified time, and so on. You can read more about this kind of trial here. (Or you could ponder how a trial on “n of 1″s had to be terminated because of lack of enrollment – and I thought I had a tough week!)

Cartoons are available for use, with credit to Hilda Bastian.