Analysis of Methodology Used in Journal of Orthopedic Surgery, Roc

Purposes: A scientific study based on incorrect methodology may lead to a biased, even wrong conclusion and affect negatively the surgeons’ judgment for patient treatment. This study is to investigate the accuracy and reliability of the methodology of five clinical studies that were published in Journal of Orthopedic Surgery, ROC. Materials and methods: Between 1994 and 1998, five papers concerning the clinical studies of fractures were randomly selected for this analysis: 4 about operative treatment and the other about preoperative scoring. Eleven items were used to evaluate the pattern of the studies, the selection of the materials and the reliability of the methods as well as the result analysis. For comparative studies, seven items were used to examine the methods of the comparison. The assessment was categorized as yes, partially or unspecified. Results: All the papers were observational studies and only one was prospec-tive study. No papers mentioned how patients were selected. None but the prospective study did clearly define the inclusion criteria and exclusion criteria. Two papers had clearly described the operative methods. The dependent and independent variables were mostly partially defined. Concerning the compara-tive studies, none but one paper had compared the baseline of the patients. Only one paper mentioned the measurement criteria. Three papers did not mention the statistical methods and only two papers presented the whole data. Discussion and conclusion: Some of the studies did not fulfill the criteria required b a scientific report. The comparative studies should have a more strict control for a fair comparison.

並列關鍵字

Orthopedic study ； Methodology ； Bias ； Scientific study

國際替代計量

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