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#UncleBob enters troubled waters for #5goodminutes
Yesterday, my twitter feed exploded with the “religion” of RCTs. If not an RCT, then we have not useful data. But RCTs have their own problems.
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The patients who agree to participate in RCTs often do not resemble our patients. Often RCTs have been disqualifications that make generalization difficult. In order to control for hidden variables, we need extremely large numbers. They are often very costly.
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Nonetheless, they are very valuable. But to assert that unless and until we have RCT data we should do nothing, makes little sense when we have patients that we are trying to help. We can and must make decisions before "definitive" studies are released.
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So please remember that we cannot answer all medical questions with RCTs, and the RCT results do not always apply to our patients. They are valuable, but so are propensity analyses, cohort studies, and other evidence.
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