Evidence-Based Health Care

Professor Karla Hemming discusses using evidence-based policy in the evaluation of policy interventions and answers the question 'how useful is the stepped-wedge study as an evaluation design? Professor Karla Hemming is the Professor of Biostatistics at the Institute of Applied Health Research, University of Birmingham.

Professor Bruno Marchal gives a talk illustrating the principles of realist evaluation using the case of the development of a new Tuberculosis control policy in Georgia. The talk focuses specifically on the central role of the programme theory, how this theory was developed and how it informed not only the policy, but also the study design. Professor Bruno Marchal is Associate Professor at the Hea...

The logic and principles behind the drive for evidence-based health care are so compelling that often the limitations of evidence go unacknowledged. Despite a strong evidence base demonstrating the health risks associated with higher body weights, and health professionals routinely instructing patients to lose weight to improve their health, the incidence of obesity is predicted to continue to ris...

The increased reliance of health systems on the digital record as the primary mechanism for storing data on consultations and other health interactions has opened new opportunities for research, healthcare innovation, and health policy. The electronic health record (eHR) is now ubiquitous in many countries, in hospital and primary care settings, and in some countries their health systems in terms...

Professor Jeffrey Aronson, Consultant Physician and Clinical Pharmacologist, Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, gives a talk on dose-response curves for the EBHC podcast series.

Carl Heneghan, Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine, employs evidence-based methods to research diagnostic reasoning, test accuracy and communicating diagnostic results to a wider audience. Professor Carl Heneghan will talk about his involvement in Tamiflu research that led to the discovery of 170,000 pages of clinical study reports, the subsequent development of Alltrials he was involved in and t...

This talk was delivered by Martin Bland. Martin Bland joined the University of York as Professor of Health Statistics in 2003, retiring and becoming Emeritus Professor in 2015. Earlier posts were at St. George's and St. Thomas's Hospital Medical Schools and in industry with ICI, working on agricultural experiments. He is the author of An Introduction to Medical Statistics, now in its fourth editio...

This guest lecture draws on nearly thirty years' experience of doing qualitative research in a variety of health settings that contain people, blood, injury, disease, emotions, and technologies. Prof Catherine Pope will describe some of the practical difficulties and everyday challenges of doing ethnography in these environments, and reflect on what it feels like to be an embodied researcher. Cath...

The global health burden of heart failure is high, both as the common end-point for many cardiovascular diseases (e.g. hypertension and heart attacks) and a common point on the trajectory of non-cardiovascular diseases (e.g. chronic respiratory disease). Despite advances in treatment, our ability to tailor strategies for prevention or management to individuals with heart failure is currently limit...

This evening lecture is given in conjunction with the Introduction to Study Design and Research Methods accredited short course, part of the Evidence-Based Healthcare programme at the University of Oxford's Department for Continuing Education. Carmen is a Public Health Nutrition scientist at the Department of Primary Care Health Sciences (University of Oxford). Her principal research interests lie...

Fiona Godlee, Editor in Chief of The BMJ, gives a talk for the EBHC podcast series Fiona Godlee is the Editor in Chief of The BMJ. She qualified as a doctor in 1985, trained as a general physician in Cambridge and London, and is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians. She has written and lectured on a broad range of issues, including health and the environment, the ethics of academic publishi...

Professor Carl Heneghan has extensive experience of working with the media. In this talk he will discuss some recent case examples, working with the BBC amongst others. This talk will discuss how using an evidence-based approach can help overcome the growing problem of fake news, and provide insights on how to work with the media to ensure your message is not distorted, and will discuss why academ...

For many good reasons, semi-structured interviews, focus groups, thematic analysis, and realist tales have become key tools within the qualitative researcher's methodological toolkit. In this presentation, Dr Cassandra Phoenix invites the audience to consider the extent to which they may have (inadvertently) become the only tools within their toolkit. Drawing on examples from across the social sci...

Dr. Martyn Sene is Deputy CEO of the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), here, he gives an introduction to the importance of measurement and metrology (the science of measurement). NPL is the UK's National Metrology Institute and is a world-leading centre of excellence in developing and applying the most accurate measurement standards, science and technology available. He is a member of the NPL Ma...

Andrea Cipriani is NIHR Research Professor at the Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford and Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist at the NHS Foundation Trust in Oxford. His main interest in psychiatry is evidence-based mental health and his research focuses on the evaluation of treatments in psychiatry, mainly major depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. Dr Cipriani is author of 267 p...

Carl Heneghan asks the question, "What is driving the increase in diagnostic testing in healthcare?" and discusses why expectations, technology and the media are contributing to the problems of too much medicine and overdiagnosis. Carl Heneghan, Professor of Evidence-Based Medicine, employs evidence-based methods to research diagnostic reasoning, test accuracy and communicating diagnostic results...

Professor David Torgerson, Director of the York Trials Unit, gives a talk for the Evidence Based Healthcare podcast series. He has published widely with over 250 peer reviewed papers many of them on the design of randomised trials including a student text book 'Designing Randomised Trials in Health Education and the Social Sciences' (2008, Palgrave MacMillan). He has a particular interest in the d...

Professor Mike Kelly, Primary Care Unit, Department of Public Health and Primary Care, Cambridge Institute of Public Health, University of Cambridge, gives a talk for the Evidence Based Healthcare seminar series. Professor Mike Kelly is Senior Visiting Fellow in the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at the Institute of Public Health and a member of St John's College at the University of...

Professor Alan Silman is an epidemiologist and a rheumatologist and is the co-author of 'Epidemiological Studies: A Practical Guide', which is the recommended textbook for the module 'Introduction to Study Design and Research Methods'. Alan Silman is currently Professor of Musculoskeletal Health at the University of Oxford. He was Director of the UK's Arthritis Research Epidemiology Unit in Manche...

Jamie Hartmann-Boyce is a Senior Researcher in Health Behaviours, based at the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences, University of Oxford. Her work focusses on obesity and tobacco control and her particular interests lie in evidence synthes Though the vast majority of people trying to lose weight do so on their own, without support from healthcare professionals or formal weight loss...

Dr Jeffrey Aronson gives a talk for the Evidence Based Healthcare series.

Professor Mike Clarke gives a talk for the Evidence Based Healthcare series.

Professor Carl Heneghan gives a talk for the Evidence Based Healthcare series. Patients are being let down by serious flaws in the creation, dissemination, and implementation of medical research. Too much of the resulting research evidence is withheld or disseminated only piecemeal. As the volume of clinical research activity has grown, the quality of evidence has often worsened, which has comprom...

There has never been such a high demand for our personal data, such that it is often said that individuals are the product, not just the client. Using the donation of general personal data and health data in example scenarios, areas such as: the unknown element in data content; trust and trustworthiness in data custodians; and meaningful public engagement, will be explored. The alternative is that...

In this talk Karolina presented various types of study design she has used in trials of treatments for chronic pain. Karolina also discussed why blinding is important and why a placebo control may be necessary, even in surgical trials. This talk was held as part of the Introduction to Study Design and Research Methods module, which is part of the MSc in Evidence-Based Health Care.