In a number of important clinical issues such as evaluation of the efficacy or effectiveness of therapeutic or preventive interventions as well as for comparing the harms of interventions, randomized controlled trials (RCTs) provide the highest levels of evidence, either directly or indirectly. It is obvious that critical appraisal of these studies to assess their validity and precision is of p...

Evidence based medicine is very important for success of modern medicine. It is the ongoing process of using the most reliable evidence from clinical studies, scientific understanding and medical practice to make the best possible medical choice for patients. Evidence based medicine is how medicine advances and how we get improvements in life expectancy and quality of life. It not only identifi...

While randomized clinical trials (RCTs) should provide the basis for evidence-based medicine, as currently designed and analyzed, they often mislead clinical decision-making. Comparative effectiveness evaluation of two treatments [Treatment 1 (T1) versus Treatment 2 (T2)] should not be determined by the statistical effect of treatments on individual measures of outcome (benefits and/or harms), ...

introduction: the successful practice of dentistry, including endodontics, relies on a wide spectrum of dental research. the quantity and quality of research evidence in endodontics have seldom been evaluated. the aim of this study was to evaluate the level of evidence in current leading endodontic journals. materials and methods: all the articles published in 2000, 2006 and 2010 in two major e...

evidence based medicine is very important for success of modern medicine. it is the ongoing process of using the most reliable evidence from clinical studies, scientific understanding and medical practice to make the best possible medical choice for patients. evidence based medicine is how medicine advances and how we get improvements in life expectancy and quality of life. it not only identifi...

Highly publicized cases of fabrication or falsification of data in clinical trials have occurred in recent years and it is likely that there are additional undetected or unreported cases. We review the available evidence on the incidence of data fraud in clinical trials, describe several prominent cases, present information on motivation and contributing factors and discuss cost-effective ways ...

Critical appraisal is an element of evidence-based medicine, which is defined as the process of carefully and systematically examining a research article to determine its reliability, validity and value in clinical practice. The major components evaluated in critical appraisal are validity, importancy, and applicability. The level of reliability of study results depend on the design of study, i...

background: this study aimed to assess the effectiveness of topiramate, a glutamate-modulating agent, in patients with treatment-resistant obsessive-compulsive disorder (ocd) as an adjunct to serotonin reuptake inhibitors (sris). materials and methods: thirty-eight patients with refractory ocd, were randomly assigned to receive topiramate or placebo. this study was designed as a 12-week, double...