Fundamental Deficiencies

Fundamental deficiencies in the megatrial methodology

The fundamental methodological deficiency of megatrials is deliberate reduction of experimental control in order to maximize recruitment and compliance of subjects. Hence, typical megatrials recruit pathologically and prognostically heterogeneous subjects, and protocols typically fail to exclude significant confounders. Therefore, most megatrials do not test a scientific hypothesis, nor are the...

Are there fundamental deficiencies in the megatrial methodology?

Does size matter? Is big beautiful? The triumph of the megatrial suggests that this is so, but Bruce Charlton, in a provocative paper entitled ‘Fundamental deficiencies in the megatrial methodology’, challenges this current conventional wisdom [1]. He sides strongly with clinicians by pointing out that one purpose of clinical trials is to provide meaningful and useful information that could be ...

Aquatic live animal radiotracing studies for ecotoxicological applications: Addressing fundamental methodological deficiencies.

The use of live animal gamma radioisotope tracer techniques in the field of ecotoxicology allows laboratory studies to accurately monitor contaminant biokinetics in real time for an individual organism. However, methods used in published studies for aquatic organisms are rarely described in sufficient detail to allow for study replication or an assessment of the errors associated with live anim...

Vitamin deficiencies in chronic kidney disease

Multiple congenital coagulation deficiencies.

A 6-week-old infant is presented who suffered from a congenital haemorrhagic disorder which caused death from subdural haemorrhage following mild trauma. Haematological investigation revealed deficiencies of factor VII and Christmas factor. Prower-Stuart factor was probably also deficient although investigation of this clotting factor was carried out only on serum obtained at necropsy.