Journal of clinical epidemiology
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Randomized Controlled Trial
The agreement between proxy and self-completed EQ-5D for care home residents was better for index scores than individual domains.
Proxy measures are an alternative source of data for care home residents who are unable to complete the health utility measure, but the agreement levels between residents and care home staff for the EQ-5D have not been investigated previously. The objective of the present study was to examine the inter-rater agreement levels for the reporting of EQ-5D by care home residents and staff, adjusting for the impact of clustering. ⋯ Proxies appear to be an acceptable source of data for index scores and QALYs but may be less reliable if individual domains are considered.
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We explored how readers interpret authors' roles based on authorship order and corresponding author. ⋯ Academic department chairs' perception of authors' contributions was influenced by corresponding author designation. Without authors' explicit contributions in research articles, many readers may draw false conclusions about author credit and accountability.
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To describe a novel CONsolidated Standards of Reporting Trials (CONSORT) adherence strategy implemented by the American Journal of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopedics (AJO-DO) and to report its impact on the completeness of reporting of published trials. ⋯ Trials published following implementation of the AJO-DO CONSORT adherence strategy completely reported more CONSORT items than those published or submitted previously.
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There is evidence to suggest that component randomized controlled trials (RCTs) within systematic reviews may be biased. It is important that these reviews are identified to prevent erroneous conclusions influencing health care policies and decisions. ⋯ Most of the sample of recent meta-analyses showed that there were signs of imbalance and/or heterogeneity in ages between treatment groups, when there should have been none. Systematic reviewers might consider using the techniques described here to assess the validity of their findings.
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To investigate the nocebo effect using randomized acupuncture trials that include sham and no-treatment groups. ⋯ Our findings suggest that (1) the nocebo effect of acupuncture is clinically meaningful and (2) the rate of patients with any adverse event may be a more appropriate indicator of the nocebo effect.