Towards evidence-based medicine for paediatricians

Under-represented

Not uncommonly, the issue of the generalisability or representativeness of a study population to the ’real world' is raised. There are some pretty big issues here, not least the idea that studies are undertaken in an unreal world, where troubles melt like chimney tops and sail above your lemon drops. Avoiding those sorts of mangled lyrics though—what’s the challenge of ‘representativeness’?

If we simply and split in into the patients, and the interventions, we can think about the threats to using study data to inform practice. As for patients—we need to ask the question—‘In what ways do the patients in-study vary from the patients out of study?’ They may be older, sicker, whiter or have fewer comorbidities. In themselves, these things may have no effect. The follow-up question ‘How do these differences change how the illness/condition behaves?’ holds the key. For if older patients have a greater response to...

from Archives of Disease in Childhood current issue https://ift.tt/2C9li8K