Every day there are stories about new discoveries in medicine. A commercial on television touts the latest and greatest advance in medicine available for only $29.99. Your health provider tells you about a new medication that is in “clinical trials” and will be available soon. How are we to make sense of such statements?
There are different types of research studies and clinical trials. A scientist may start with a question and set up an experiment to get the answer. Maybe a new drug needs to be tested to see if it cures an infection. When studying people, scientists often keep track of a group of people for several years trying to find out what those people have in common and how they differ.
According to the National Institutes of Health, scientists start a clinical trial by recruiting volunteers and randomly dividing them into two groups. One receives a treatment, and the other, the control group, gets a placebo. The study is also masked. This means that neither the scientists nor the volunteers know who is getting the treatment or the placebo. At the end of the study, everyone learns which group was getting the treatment and which was on placebo and the results are analyzed. From there, the treatment is further tested and may eventually become a standard of care.
So how can you evaluate the story you heard on last night’s news? The National Institutes of Health recommends you ask yourself:
- Was it a study in the laboratory, in animals, or in people?
- Does the study include enough people like you?
- Was it a randomized controlled clinical trial involving thousands of people?
- Where was the research done?
- If a new treatment was being tested, were there side effects? How many people were affected?
- Who paid for the research? Do those providing support stand to gain financially from the results?
- Who is reporting the results? Is the newspaper, magazine, radio station, or television station a reliable source of medical news?
If you have questions about research or something you heard in the news, talk with your health provider. He or she can help you understand the results and what they could mean for your health. Remember that progress in medical research takes many years. For more information, visit the Clinical Trials Division of the National Institutes of Health.
