Study Design and Data Reporting

• • Online Discussion [mp4]

• • National Cluster-Randomized Trial of Duty-hour flexibility in surgical training.  Bilimoria KY, Chung JW, et al.  NEJM 2016;1-15.  DOI:  10.1056/NEJMoa1515724

The article discussed  is one of the exceedingly rare educational articles in the NEJM.  It describes a very vigorous study of the impact of duty-hour flexibility on patient outcomes in surgery.  During the call-in session we will discuss the following:  

1.  The importance of good study design

2.  The special challenge of studying a "no-difference" or "non-inferiority" comparison

3.  Good data reporting practices

4.  Significant research does not require huge NIH grants