Research Methodology in the Medical and Biological Sciences

FRONT COVER......Page 1
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY IN THE MEDICAL AND BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES......Page 4
COPYRIGHT PAGE......Page 5
CONTENTS......Page 6
PREFACE......Page 12
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS......Page 13
CONTRIBUTORS......Page 16
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS......Page 24
1.1 Philosophy of the natural sciences......Page 28
1.2 Philosophy of the social sciences......Page 51
Further reading......Page 58
2.1 A brief introduction to ethics......Page 60
2.2 Scientific conduct and misconduct......Page 63
2.3 Misconduct and why it occurs......Page 65
2.4 Fabrication and other forms of misconduct affecting the truth claims of scientific findings......Page 67
2.5 Authorship issues......Page 70
2.6 Salami, imalas and duplicate publication......Page 73
2.7 The investigation and punishment of scientific misconduct......Page 74
References......Page 76
Appendix 1......Page 77
3.1 Introduction......Page 80
3.2 Basic principles of human research ethics......Page 81
3.3 International regulation......Page 83
3.4 The ethics of animal research......Page 97
References......Page 100
Appendix 1 World Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects......Page 101
Appendix 2 Oviedo Convention (Council of Europe, European Treaty Series 164)......Page 107
Appendix 3 Oviedo Convention - Additional Protocol Concerning Biomedical Research, Chapter I–IX (Council of Europe, European Treaty Series 195)......Page 109
4.1 Introduction......Page 120
4.2 Your scientific problem......Page 122
4.4 Literature, methods and techniques......Page 124
4.5 Research conditions......Page 127
4.6 Data types......Page 130
4.7 Techniques......Page 132
4.8 Repeatability, reproducibility and reliability......Page 136
4.9 Validity, effect measure and choice of statistical test......Page 139
4.10 Experimental protocol......Page 143
4.11 Experimental routine......Page 149
Further reading......Page 150
5.1 Information literacy......Page 152
5.2 Systematic literature search......Page 154
5.3 How to formulate a query: PICO......Page 156
5.4 Search technique......Page 160
5.5 Methodology filters......Page 163
5.6 Quality: critical appraisal......Page 165
5.7 Impact factor......Page 167
5.8 Principal bibliographic databases......Page 172
5.9 Staying up to date......Page 177
5.10 Medical and scientific Internet search engines......Page 181
5.11 Personal reference databases......Page 182
Further reading......Page 187
6.1 Introduction......Page 188
6.2 Recombinant DNA technology......Page 190
6.3 DNA and RNA: isolation, identification, synthesis and analysis......Page 195
6.4 Practical applications of DNA/RNA technology......Page 201
6.5 Protein analyses......Page 214
6.6 Bioinformatics......Page 222
References......Page 224
7.1 Introduction......Page 226
7.2 Long-term goals and specific aims......Page 228
7.3 Background and significance......Page 232
7.5 Pilot studies......Page 234
7.6 Rules for basic medical research projects......Page 236
Further reading......Page 238
8.1 Controlled clinical trials......Page 240
8.3 Estimating sample size......Page 254
8.4 ‘Non-inferiority’ studies......Page 261
8.5 Generalization......Page 264
References......Page 265
Guidelines......Page 266
9.1 Introduction......Page 268
9.2 Definitions......Page 269
9.3 The role of epidemiology......Page 270
9.4 Population and sample......Page 272
9.5 Measures of disease occurrence, association, risk and implications......Page 273
9.6 Vital statistics......Page 278
9.7 Study designs of epidemiological studies......Page 281
9.8 Effect measures in epidemiological studies......Page 288
9.10 Measurement error and sources of error......Page 295
9.11 Tests and validity......Page 298
9.12 Causes of disease......Page 302
9.13 Association versus causality......Page 305
Further reading......Page 307
10.1 Qualitative versus quantitative research......Page 308
10.2 Using qualitative research......Page 310
10.3 What qualitative research cannot be used for......Page 311
10.4 Samples in qualitative studies......Page 312
10.5 Reliability and validity......Page 313
10.6 Ethical challenges in qualitative research......Page 314
10.7 Qualitative data collection......Page 318
10.8 Triangulation......Page 328
10.9 Analyses of qualitative data......Page 330
10.10 Releasing qualitative data......Page 333
References......Page 334
Further reading......Page 336
11.1 Introduction......Page 338
11.2 Effect measure, hypothesis testing and confidence interval......Page 339
11.3 Bernoulli trial......Page 342
11.4 Comparing two proportions......Page 345
11.5 Measures of association in 2 × 2 tables......Page 350
11.6 Normal distribution......Page 356
11.7 Comparison of means......Page 359
11.8 Non-parametric methods......Page 369
11.9 Regression analysis......Page 377
References......Page 390
Further reading......Page 391
12.1 Introduction......Page 392
12.2 Systematic reviews......Page 393
12.3 Critical appraisal of a systematic review: one example......Page 395
References......Page 407
Further reading......Page 408
13.2 The scientific paper......Page 410
13.3 Posters......Page 437
Further reading......Page 440
14.1 Introduction......Page 442
14.2 Preparing the lecture......Page 443
14.3 Lecture content and form......Page 445
14.4 Manuscript......Page 451
14.5 Delivering a lecture......Page 454
Further reading......Page 459
15.1 Introduction......Page 460
15.2 Getting started......Page 462
15.3 The postdoctoral fellow and junior scientist......Page 464
15.4 What goes into a successful grant application?......Page 470
15.5 The investigator-initiated research grant......Page 472
15.6 Multiproject grants......Page 475
15.7 International research collaborations......Page 478
15.8 The European Union\'s seventh Framework Programme......Page 481
References......Page 483
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M......Page 498
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Z......Page 510