Clinical and Translational Science Institute
Center for Evidence-Based Medicine and Health Outcomes Research

Key Methodology


 

The center for evidence based medicine and health outcome research (EBM) at the University of South Florida will make Evidence-based resources available in real time. The aim is to provide reliable data on benefits and harms (evidence profiles) related to interventions for about 1,000 key decisions in the management of cancer and other diseases. Data on benefits and harms will be based on the totality of research evidence as generated by using currently best methods research synthesis (which is systematic review/meta-analysis). Other EBM services will include facilitation evidence-based guidelines development, indirect meta-analyses and decision-analyses. It is expected that EBM services will improve practice of medicine, inform clinical research, regulatory and policy decisions, facilitate decision-making and eventually patients’ outcomes.

 

Research Synthesis: terminology.

The application of strategies that limit bias in the assembly, critical appraisal, and synthesis of all relevant studies on a specific topic. Meta-analysis may be, but is not necessary, used as part of this process. Adapted from Last JM. Dictionary of Epidemiology, 2001

Meta-analysis. The statistical synthesis of the data from separate but similar, i.e. comparable studies, leading to a quantitative summary of the pooled results. Adapted from Last JM. Dictionary of Epidemiology, 2001

Decision analysis

Decision analysis: Decision analysis is a tool that clinicians can use to choose an option that maximizes the overall net benefit to a patient. It is an explicit, quantitative, and systematic approach to decision making under conditions of uncertainty. (Lee et al. Tips for Teachers of Evidence-based Medicine: Making Sense of Decision Analysis Using a Decision Tree. J Gen Intern Med. 2009 Feb 27. PMID: 19247720)

Data mining

The practice of searching through large amounts of computerized data to find useful patterns or trends. (Merriam- Webster definition)

Health outcomes

Outcomes research seeks to understand the end results of particular health care practices and interventions. (AHRQ definition)

Clinical decision support systems

Clinical Decision Support Systems are "active knowledge systems which use two or more items of patient data to generate case-specific advice" (Wyatt J, Spiegelhalter D, 1991).