Indeed, beware the confusion of association with causation.
One of problems with “big data” at the moment is that a lot pf people haven’t yet quite got hold of the strengths and limitations.
Despite this I heartily agree that having well structured electronic records will be a very powerful tool. We just have to educate the users in how to create them reliably.
Cheers, Geoff
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> On 10 Sep 2018, at 23:39, Ian Trimble <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Interesting.
>
> Plenty of anecdotal / defensive rebuttals in the comments, I note.
>
> Not an RCT of course, so perhaps the conditions that led to patients having surgery also affected their long-term outcomes?
>
> But it would certainly be difficult to deduce any benefit from surgery.
>
>
> Trims
>
>
>> On 10 Sep 2018, at 17:56, Trefor Roscoee <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>> When I was teaching Clinical Informatics in the late 90s, I came up with an example of clinical questions that could only be answered when electronic health records were universal or at least covered over half of a population.
>>
>> One question was "does having tonsillectomy increase your risk of long term health problems?" I postulated that the removal of the lymphoid tissue could alter immunity or increase risk of infection.
>>
>> It seems it does https://www.iflscience.com/health-and-medicine/kids-who-get-their-tonsils-removed-have-substantially-greater-rates-of-illness-later-in-life/
>>
>> Dr Trefor Roscoe FFCI
>> Medical Information Consultant
>> Locum General Practitioner
>
>
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