Steve Smith said
"Fourth, I have a tendency, and I think others do also, to slip sometimes
into a mindset of research nihilism. A lot of research papers have a lot of
flaws, so you start to think all research is garbage. You don't want your
skepticism to turn into cynicism."
I think this is a very important point when it comes to the application of a
piece of research to clinical practice and I always remind the students of
it. I like Alejandro Jadad's definition of it as the "I am a epidemiologist"
bias - the rejection of a study on the basis of any flaw no matter how
minor.
Andrew Jull
Clinical Nurse Consultant
Auckland Hospital
Private Bag 92024
Auckland
NEW ZEALAND
Phone: +64 9 3797440
Fax:+64 9 3072818 (external)
7718 (internal)
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