{"id":34955,"date":"2015-08-11T10:07:30","date_gmt":"2015-08-11T09:07:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/?p=34955"},"modified":"2015-08-11T10:07:30","modified_gmt":"2015-08-11T09:07:30","slug":"the-bmj-today-bias-that-keeps-researchers-awake-at-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2015\/08\/11\/the-bmj-today-bias-that-keeps-researchers-awake-at-night\/","title":{"rendered":"The BMJ Today: Bias that keeps researchers awake at night"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2015\/08\/clinicaltrial.gov2_1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-34958\" src=\"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2015\/08\/clinicaltrial.gov2_1.jpg\" alt=\"clinicaltrial.gov2\" width=\"135\" height=\"135\" \/><\/a><strong>\u2022 <\/strong>Last week, we saw that prospective registration of trials with specific outcome measures <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/351\/bmj.h4304\">could have a huge impact<\/a>. Addressing this kind of publication bias is a great step forward, although other forms of bias still keep researchers and science publishers alike awake at night.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u2022 <\/strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/351\/bmj.h4283\">Our most recent endgames article highlights how<\/a> even randomised controlled trials (RCTs), often regarded as the gold standard in medical research, can be subject to selection bias, ascertainment bias, and resentful demoralisation.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2015\/08\/myocardial_infarction_2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-34959\" src=\"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2015\/08\/myocardial_infarction_2-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"myocardial_infarction_2\" width=\"135\" height=\"135\" \/><\/a><strong>\u2022\u00a0<\/strong>One way to get around selection bias is demonstrated <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/351\/bmj.h3913\">in our newly published research article<\/a>, comparing myocardial infarction care in Sweden to care in the United Kingdom. Using such large longitudinal cohort studies based on country wide registry data is a huge undertaking, but in this case it reveals important differences that could change how guidelines are applied. However, as noted by <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/351\/bmj.h4133\">Kumar Dharmarajan in his linked editorial<\/a>, there is some way to go before all patient data is properly recorded.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2015\/08\/20yrsonline.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft  wp-image-34961\" src=\"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2015\/08\/20yrsonline-150x150.png\" alt=\"20yrsonline\" width=\"135\" height=\"135\" \/><\/a><strong>\u2022\u00a0<\/strong>Our recent celebration of 20 years of <em>The BMJ<\/em> website has highlighted how research is the backbone of our journal\u2019s reputation and success. When we asked readers and contributors which articles were most memorable, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/351\/bmj.h3660\">nine of the 20 nominations were original research articles<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>We have recently published <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/351\/bmj.h4125\">a summary of \u201cthe ones that got away,&#8221;<\/a> several of which deal with research and research methods. The results of our readers poll <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/content\/351\/bmj.h4125\">are also available<\/a>. To see more about the last 20 years of <em>The BMJ <\/em>website, (including screenshots from 1996 to show how far we\u2019ve come), our infographic timeline is available at\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/twenty\">www.bmj.com\/twenty<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Will Stahl-\u00adTimmins<\/strong> is interactive data visualisation designer,<\/em> The BMJ<strong>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u2022 Last week, we saw that prospective registration of trials with specific outcome measures could have a huge impact. Addressing this kind of publication bias is a great step forward, although other forms of bias still keep researchers and science publishers alike awake at night. \u2022 Our most recent endgames article highlights how even randomised [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"btn btn-secondary understrap-read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2015\/08\/11\/the-bmj-today-bias-that-keeps-researchers-awake-at-night\/\">Read More&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5750],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34955","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-bmj-today"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34955","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34955"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34955\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34955"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34955"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}