Research Methodology in the Medical and Biological Sciences Book

Preface     xi
Contributors     xv
List of abbreviations and symbols     xxiii
Philosophy of Science   Bjorn Hofmann   Soren Holm   Jens-Gustav Iversen     1
Philosophy of the natural sciences     1
Philosophy of the social sciences     24
Ethics and Scientific Conduct   Soren Holm     33
A brief introduction to ethics     33
Scientific conduct and misconduct     36
Misconduct and why it occurs     38
Fabrication and other forms of misconduct affecting the truth claims of scientific findings     40
Authorship issues     43
Salami, imalas and duplicate publication     46
The investigation and punishment of scientific misconduct     47
Appendix 1     50
Ethics in Human and Animal Studies   Soren Holm   Bjorn Reino Olsen     53
Introduction     53
Basic principles of human research ethics     54
International regulation     56
The ethics of animal research     70
World (Medical Association Declaration of Helsinki Ethical Principles for Medical Research Involving Human Subjects     74
Oviedo Convention (Council of Europe,European Treaty Series 164)     80
Oviedo Convention-Additional Protocol Concerning Biomedical Research, Chapter I-IX (Council of Europe, European Treaty Series 195)     82
Research Methodology: Strategies, Planning and Analysis   Haakon Breien Benestad   Petter Laake     93
Introduction     93
Your scientific problem     95
More on scientific problems     97
Literature, methods and techniques     97
Research conditions     100
Data types     103
Techniques     105
Repeatability, reproducibility and reliability     109
Validity, effect measure and choice of statistical test     112
Experimental protocol     116
Experimental routine     122
Literature Search and Personal Reference Databases   Anne-Marie B. Haraldstad   Ellen Christophersen     125
Information literacy     125
Systematic literature search     127
How to formulate a query: PICO     129
Search technique     133
Methodology filters     136
Quality: critical appraisal     138
Impact factor     140
Principal bibliographic databases     145
Staying up to date     150
Medical and scientific internet search engines     154
Personal reference databases     155
Methods in Molecular Biology   Sigbjorn Fossum   Erik Dissen     161
Introduction     161
Recombinant DNA technology     163
DNA and RNA: isolation, identification, synthesis and analysis     168
Practical applications of DNA/RNA technology     174
Protein analyses     187
Bioinformatics     195
Strategies and Methods of Basic Medical Research   Bjorn Reino Olsen   Haakon Breien Benestad     199
Introduction     199
Long-term goals and specific aims     201
Background and significance     205
Experimental strategies and methods     207
Pilot studies     207
Rules for basic medical research projects     209
Clinical Research   Eva Skovlund   Morten H. Vatn     213
Controlled clinical trials     213
Publication bias     227
Estimating sample size     227
'Non-inferiority' studies     234
Generalization     237
Epidemiology: Concepts and Methods   Dag S. Thelle   Petter Laake     241
Introduction     241
Definitions     242
The role of epidemiology     243
Population and sample     245
Measures of disease occurrence, association, risk and implications     246
Vital statistics     251
Study designs of epidemiological studies     254
Effect measures in epidemiological studies     261
Experimental studies and randomized control trials     268
Measurement error and sources of error     268
Tests and validity     271
Causes of disease     275
Association versus causality     278
Qualitative Research   Harald Grimen   Benedicte Ingstad     281
Qualitative versus quantitative research     281
Using qualitative research     283
What qualitative research cannot be used for     284
Samples in qualitative studies     285
Reliability and validity     286
Ethical challenges in qualitative research     287
Qualitative data collection     291
Triangulation     301
Analyses of qualitative data     303
Releasing qualitative data      306
Statistical Issues   Petter Laake   Thore Egeland   Eva Skovlund     311
Introduction     311
Effect measure, hypothesis testing and confidence interval     312
Bernoulli trial     315
Comparing two proportions     318
Measures of association in 2 x 2 tables     323
Normal distribution     329
Comparison of means     332
Non-parametric methods     342
Regression analysis     350
Evidence-Based Practice and Critical Appraisal of Systematic Reviews   Liv Merete Reinar   Peter M. Bradley     365
Introduction     365
Systematic reviews     366
Critical appraisal of a systematic review: one example     368
Summary     380
Scientific Communication   Haakon Breien Benestad     383
Introduction     383
The scientific paper     383
Posters     410
Successful Lecturing   Heidi Kiil Blomhoff     415
Introduction     415
Preparing the lecture     416
Lecture content and form     418
Manuscript     424
Delivering a lecture      427
Guide to Grant Applications   Bjorn Reino Olsen   Petter Laake   Ole Petter Ottersen     433
Introduction     433
Getting started     435
The postdoctoral fellow and junior scientist     437
What goes into a successful grant application?     443
The investigator-initiated research grant     445
Multiproject grants     448
International research collaborations     451
The European Union's seventh Framework Programme     454
Summary and perspective     456
Index     457