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	<title>Prescribing Advice for GPs &#187; Critical Appraisal Tips</title>
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	<description>An NHS Prescribing Advisers&#039; Blog</description>
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		<title>Non Sequitur</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2007/06/non-sequitur/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2007/06/non-sequitur/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 20 Jun 2007 10:35:17 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[Non sequitur, translated from Latin to English, means &#8220;it does not follow&#8221;. Non sequiturs are often used in advertising both overtly and covertly. An example of an overt use would be placing two statements next to each other so that the reader correlates the two statements despite no correlation existing. For example: Drug X exhibits [...]]]></description>
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		<title>How drug reps influence prescribing</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2007/04/how-drug-reps-influence-prescribing/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2007/04/how-drug-reps-influence-prescribing/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 25 Apr 2007 16:02:07 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=356</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[PLoS Medicine has published an article detailing many of the tricks of the trade used by pharmaceutical company sales representatives. A former pharmaceutical sales representative and a physician who researches pharmaceutical marketing wrote the article. The article cites the US$4.8 billion investment made by pharmaceutical companies in 2000 in direct promotional activity to prescribers from [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Composite end points</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2007/04/composite-end-points/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2007/04/composite-end-points/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 13 Apr 2007 13:26:27 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=348</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[The British Medical Journal has published a systematic review that examined the use of composite end points in cardiovascular trials. The aim was to assess the importance to patients of each component in the composite end points and to examine the frequency of these events in the studies. The study examined cardiovascular randomised controlled trials [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Opinion Leaders</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/09/opinion-leaders/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/09/opinion-leaders/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 13 Sep 2006 18:32:32 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=228</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Promotion of medicines relies heavily on data from clinical studies but many people want to know what others are doing before they will consider using a new product. To overcome this obstacle promotional activity will often seek to use opinion leaders. Opinion Leaders are well-respected authorities in their area of expertise, whose name will be [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Skip the Abstract</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/07/skip-the-abstract/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/07/skip-the-abstract/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 21 Jul 2006 09:32:25 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=200</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Clinical Papers are written up in a standard scientific style with an introduction of the paper topic, details of the method used in the study, the study results and a discussion of these results. Often clinical papers will also have a summary at the beginning called an abstract. The British Medical Journal has added a [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Statistical vs. Clinical Significance</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/02/statistical-vs-clinical-significance/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/02/statistical-vs-clinical-significance/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 10 Feb 2006 11:47:53 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=135</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Clinical Trials are constructed to statistically test a hypothesis. Once the study has been completed the results are analysed based upon the original hypothesis (primary outcome) and conclusions are drawn based upon the analysis. It is generally accepted that the play of chance could have produced the observed results up to 1 time in 20. [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Surrogate Outcomes</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/01/surrogate-outcomes/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2006/01/surrogate-outcomes/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 16 Jan 2006 13:49:09 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=121</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Clinical Trials sometimes use surrogate endpoints as the measure of the primary outcome of the study. Surrogate endpoints are a proxy for what would ideally be measured but for limitations imposed by time, cost or ethical considerations. However, these surrogate endpoints may not be an accurate predictor for the outcome we would ideally like to [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Post-hoc Endpoints</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/post-hoc-endpoints/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/post-hoc-endpoints/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 30 Dec 2005 11:54:49 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=110</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Focussing on secondary endpoints has already been covered, but what do trial investigators do if both the primary and secondary endpoints are unconvincing? Data dredging may produce a statistically more convincing result. Data dredging is the process of analysing all the trial data looking for outcomes that are statistically significant; it produces post-hoc or tertiary [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Secondary Endpoints</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/secondary-endpoints/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/secondary-endpoints/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 20 Dec 2005 16:36:42 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=102</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[All clinical trials are established to answer a clinical question; this is called the primary endpoint. It is to be hoped that the primary endpoint is demonstrated to be statistically significant at the end of the study but this is not always the case. When a primary endpoint is not significant there is often a [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Publication Bias</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/publication-bias/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/publication-bias/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Tue, 13 Dec 2005 09:43:26 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=94</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Studies that are published are commonly positive about the study drug with very few showing a negative outcome. This is because of Publication Bias. Publication Bias occurs when only certain information, namely positive trial results, is published in journals. This is an age old tactic as many scientists, upon getting a poor result, blame the [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Manipulate Graphical Data</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/manipulate-graphical-data/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/manipulate-graphical-data/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Wed, 07 Dec 2005 15:51:43 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=92</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Data represented in graphs can be manipulated by altering the axes of the graph. There are many ways the data can be altered including: using different scales on graphs that are side by side using log scales to compress the differences using amputated axes to exaggerate the differences origins of graphs not starting at zero [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>0</slash:comments>
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		<title>Poor Comparators</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/poor-comparators/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/poor-comparators/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 04 Dec 2005 11:00:05 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=91</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[One of the easiest ways to show that one drug is effective compared to another is to choose a poor comparator. This can be done in several different ways: compare with a low or sub-therapeutic dose to enhance the effects of the study drug compare with a pharmacologically poor molecule to enhance the effects of [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Relative vs. Absolute Benefit</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/relative-vs-absolute-benefit/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/relative-vs-absolute-benefit/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 01 Dec 2005 16:13:28 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=89</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Published studies will often quote risk reductions and almost without exception these are relative risk reductions rather than actual risk reductions. This is because relative risk reductions are usually numerically greater than the actual risk reduction. Larger numbers will look and sound more impressive. For example, in the FIT 1 study hip fracture rates were [...]]]></description>
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		<title>Generalised findings</title>
		<link>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/generalised-findings/</link>
		<comments>http://www.prescriber.org.uk/2005/12/generalised-findings/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 01 Dec 2005 16:04:57 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Matthew Robinson</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Critical Appraisal Tips]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.prescriber.org.uk/?p=88</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[Evidence from trials should be interpreted carefully to ensure that conclusions and recommendations are not applied to groups of patients who were not represented in the trials. It is inappropriate to extrapolate the findings of a study to a patient group or type who were not present in the study. For example, some studies of [...]]]></description>
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