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OpenTrials
Completed

NCT Number: NCT02006017

Do Clinicians Want Recommendations?

The use of the best evidence available for decision-making is nowadays an undisputed goal in health care. However, this is not always achieved in the context of clinical practice. Two of the potential solutions to bridge the gap between evidence and the clinical practice are the "evidence summaries" and the "evidence based recommendations". However, it is not clear, and frequently controversial, to what extent clinicians consider helpful recommendations accompanying evidence summaries. The investigators will explore this question by conducting a study where clinicians will be randomized to receive a clinical scenario accompanied by an evidence summary plus a recommendation and a second clinical scenario accompanied by only for an evidence summary (group A) or vice versa (Group B). The outcome will be clinicians' preferences.

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Key information

Conditions

Healthy Individuals (Clinicians)

Sex eligibility

All sexes

Study type

Interventional

Phase

Not applicable

Primary location

McMaster University

Hamilton, Ontario, L8S 4K1, Canada

Who can participate

Healthy volunteers accepted: Yes

Only the study team can determine whether someone qualifies for participation.

Inclusion criteria

  • Were trained as Medical Doctors
  • Practice primary care or general internal medicine.

Exclusion criteria

none

Treatment and study plan

Evidence summary alone plus a recommendation

Other

Evidence summary alone

Other

Primary outcomes

  1. Preferences

    Time frame: Immediately after the intervention (Survey)

    Preference: for the evidence summary plus the accompanying recommendation or for the evidence summary alone. We will assess this outcome with a 7-point Lickert scale This outcome will be assessed after the presentation of the two clinical scenarios.

Secondary outcomes

  1. Understanding

    Time frame: Immediately after the intervention (Survey)

    Understanding: Percentage of correct answers regarding the understanding of the evidence: understanding of baseline risk, risk difference, confidence interval and quality of the evidence assessment.

  2. Interpretation of benefits and harms

    Time frame: Immediately after the intervention (Survey)

    Interpretation of benefits and harms: Distribution of the interpretation of the magnitude of the benefits in comparison with harms

  3. Intended course of action

    Time frame: Immediately after the intervention (Survey)

    Intended course of action: For the clinical questions related with strong recommendations, we will compare the percentage of appropriate decisions (i.e. decisions that match the strong recommendation).

Sponsors and collaborators

Lead sponsor

McMaster University

Other

Registry information

Official study title

Do Clinicians Want Recommendations? A Randomized Trial Comparing Evidence Summaries With and Without Evidence Based Recommendations

Important dates

Study start
2013
Primary completion
2017
Study completion
2017
First posted
Dec 9, 2013
Registry last updated
Sep 1, 2017

OpenTrials presents study information sourced from ClinicalTrials.gov. The official registry record should be consulted for the latest information.

View the official ClinicalTrials.gov record (opens in a new tab)

This listing is for discovery and informational purposes only. It is not medical advice, does not guarantee that a study is recruiting, and does not determine eligibility. Contact the study team and a qualified healthcare professional when considering participation.