Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions


Book Description

Healthcare providers, consumers, researchers and policy makers are inundated with unmanageable amounts of information, including evidence from healthcare research. It has become impossible for all to have the time and resources to find, appraise and interpret this evidence and incorporate it into healthcare decisions. Cochrane Reviews respond to this challenge by identifying, appraising and synthesizing research-based evidence and presenting it in a standardized format, published in The Cochrane Library (www.thecochranelibrary.com). The Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions contains methodological guidance for the preparation and maintenance of Cochrane intervention reviews. Written in a clear and accessible format, it is the essential manual for all those preparing, maintaining and reading Cochrane reviews. Many of the principles and methods described here are appropriate for systematic reviews applied to other types of research and to systematic reviews of interventions undertaken by others. It is hoped therefore that this book will be invaluable to all those who want to understand the role of systematic reviews, critically appraise published reviews or perform reviews themselves.




Crossing the Quality Chasm


Book Description

Second in a series of publications from the Institute of Medicine's Quality of Health Care in America project Today's health care providers have more research findings and more technology available to them than ever before. Yet recent reports have raised serious doubts about the quality of health care in America. Crossing the Quality Chasm makes an urgent call for fundamental change to close the quality gap. This book recommends a sweeping redesign of the American health care system and provides overarching principles for specific direction for policymakers, health care leaders, clinicians, regulators, purchasers, and others. In this comprehensive volume the committee offers: A set of performance expectations for the 21st century health care system. A set of 10 new rules to guide patient-clinician relationships. A suggested organizing framework to better align the incentives inherent in payment and accountability with improvements in quality. Key steps to promote evidence-based practice and strengthen clinical information systems. Analyzing health care organizations as complex systems, Crossing the Quality Chasm also documents the causes of the quality gap, identifies current practices that impede quality care, and explores how systems approaches can be used to implement change.




Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine, Twenty-First Edition (Vol.1 & Vol.2)


Book Description

The Voice of Clinical ReasonHarrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine is the world's most trusted clinical medicine text—and a superb resource for learning the art and science of clinical reasoning. Recognized by healthcare professionals worldwide as the leading authority on applied pathophysiology and clinical medicine, Harrison’s Principles of Internal Medicine provides the informational foundation you need for the best patient care possible. This new edition is fully updated with timely new chapters and essential updates across the spectrum of internal medicine. Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine stands as the benchmark for authoritative, practical information on patient care and the pathogenesis and clinical management of symptoms and signs and specific diseases. Written and edited by the world’s top experts in their respective fields, this landmark guide provides the comprehensive, accurate, and essential coverage of the pathogenesis, diagnosis, and treatment of disease. Harrison’s is world-renowned as the most authoritative source for: • Descriptions of disease mechanisms and how the clinician can apply that knowledge for the best patient care and optimal diagnosis and treatment of specific diseases • Clear, concise schemas that facilitate the generation of differential diagnoses to reason efficiently through complex real world clinical cases • The physiologic and epidemiologic basis of signs and symptoms, which are covered through a wealth of unsurpassed expert guidance and linked to the disease-specific chapters that follow • Updated clinical trial results and recommended guidelines • Excellent and extensive visual support, including radiographs, clinical photos, schematics, and high-quality drawings • Coverage of both therapeutic approaches and specific treatment regimens • Practical clinical decision trees and algorithms • Organ-specific sections, with clinically relevant pathophysiology and practical clinical advice on the approach to the patient, strategies towards building a differential diagnosis, outstanding clinical algorithms and diagnostic schema, a wealth of clinical images and diagrams, current clinical guidelines, general and specific approaches to therapy Harrison’s remains the most trusted resource in a world influenced by endless sources of medical information. The most timely and comprehensive updates from the world’s top experts are featured in the 21st edition: • Current coverage of the diagnosis and treatment of diseases, from COVID to dementia to sepsis to multiple sclerosis to lung cancer • Updated content that reflects new approved therapeutics and new practice-changing guidelines and evidence summaries • More than 1000 clinical, pathological, and radiographic photographs, diagnostic and therapeutic decision trees, and clear schematics and diagrams describing pathophysiologic processes • More than a dozen atlases featuring curated collections of visual aspects of diagnosis and management • Complete, updated curation and synthesis of primary medical literature which incorporates current data from major studies and clinical trials • Clinical reasoning resources and helpful disease/presentation schemas • Clinically relevant coverage of disease mechanics and pathophysiology, and related therapeutic mechanisms




Current Catalog


Book Description

First multi-year cumulation covers six years: 1965-70.




Registries for Evaluating Patient Outcomes


Book Description

This User’s Guide is intended to support the design, implementation, analysis, interpretation, and quality evaluation of registries created to increase understanding of patient outcomes. For the purposes of this guide, a patient registry is an organized system that uses observational study methods to collect uniform data (clinical and other) to evaluate specified outcomes for a population defined by a particular disease, condition, or exposure, and that serves one or more predetermined scientific, clinical, or policy purposes. A registry database is a file (or files) derived from the registry. Although registries can serve many purposes, this guide focuses on registries created for one or more of the following purposes: to describe the natural history of disease, to determine clinical effectiveness or cost-effectiveness of health care products and services, to measure or monitor safety and harm, and/or to measure quality of care. Registries are classified according to how their populations are defined. For example, product registries include patients who have been exposed to biopharmaceutical products or medical devices. Health services registries consist of patients who have had a common procedure, clinical encounter, or hospitalization. Disease or condition registries are defined by patients having the same diagnosis, such as cystic fibrosis or heart failure. The User’s Guide was created by researchers affiliated with AHRQ’s Effective Health Care Program, particularly those who participated in AHRQ’s DEcIDE (Developing Evidence to Inform Decisions About Effectiveness) program. Chapters were subject to multiple internal and external independent reviews.




Understanding and Evaluating Research


Book Description

Understanding and Evaluating Research: A Critical Guide shows students how to be critical consumers of research and to appreciate the power of methodology as it shapes the research question, the use of theory in the study, the methods used, and how the outcomes are reported. The book starts with what it means to be a critical and uncritical reader of research, followed by a detailed chapter on methodology, and then proceeds to a discussion of each component of a research article as it is informed by the methodology. The book encourages readers to select an article from their discipline, learning along the way how to assess each component of the article and come to a judgment of its rigor or quality as a scholarly report.




The Woman Who Dared


Book Description

In the early days of motion pictures—before superstars, before studio conglomerates, before even the advent of sound—there was a woman named Pearl White (1889–1938). A quintessential beauty of the time, with her perfectly tousled bob and come-hither stare, White's rise to stardom was swift; her assumption of the title of queen of American motion picture serials equally deserved. Born the youngest of five children in a small, rural Missouri farm town, White first began performing in high school. She would eventually make the decision to cut her education short, dropping out to go on the Trousdale Stock Company. A bit player in the early years of her career, she was eventually spotted by the Powers Film Company in New York. She made her film debut in 1910 and soon set herself apart from her female colleagues with her reputation for fearless performances that often involved her own stunt work. It was that same daring attitude that would put her on the map internationally as an actress. From flying airplanes to swimming across rapid rivers, to racing cars in serials like The Perils of Pauline (1914), White was undaunted by the demands of her onscreen career. She went on to star in popular serial classics such as The New Exploits of Elaine (1915), The Iron Claw (1916), The Fatal Ring (1917), and The Lightning Raider (1919). As active socially as she was professionally, White would also lend her audacious spirit to activism as she took part in the early feminist movement. Her bravery and mastery of her craft made her a positive role model for suffragettes who battled for women's rights in the United States. The Woman Who Dared: The Life and Times of Pearl White, Queen of the Serials, is the first full-length biography of this pioneering star. In this study of film history and female agency, Drew delves into the cultural impact of White's work and how it evolved along a concurrent trajectory with the social upheavals of the Progressive Era.