1,721,004 research outputs found
Therapeutic ultrasound for osteoarthritis of the knee or hip
No full textBACKGROUND: Osteoarthritis is the most common form of joint disease and the
leading cause of pain and physical disability in the elderly. Therapeutic
ultrasound is one of several physical therapy modalities suggested for the
management of pain and loss of function due to osteoarthritis (OA).
OBJECTIVES: To compare therapeutic ultrasound with sham or no specific
intervention in terms of effects on pain and function safety outcomes in patients
with knee or hip OA.
SEARCH STRATEGY: We updated the search in CENTRAL, CINAHL, EMBASE, MEDLINE and
PEDro up to 23 July 2009, checked conference proceedings, reference lists, and
contacted authors.
SELECTION CRITERIA: Studies were included if they were randomised or
quasi-randomised controlled trials that compared therapeutic ultrasound with a
sham intervention or no intervention in patients with osteoarthritis of the knee
or hip.
DATA COLLECTION AND ANALYSIS: Two independent review authors extracted data using
standardized forms. Investigators were contacted to obtain missing outcome
information. Standardised mean differences (SMDs) were calculated for pain and
function, relative risks for safety outcomes. Trials were combined using
inverse-variance random-effects meta-analysis.
MAIN RESULTS: Compared to the previous version of the review, four additional
trials were identified resulting in the inclusion of five small sized trials in a
total of 341 patients with knee OA. No trial included patients with hip OA. Two
evaluated pulsed ultrasound, two continuous and one evaluated both pulsed and
continuous ultrasound as the active treatment. The methodological quality and the
quality of reporting was poor and a high degree of heterogeneity among the trials
was revealed for function (88%). For pain, there was an effect in favour of
ultrasound therapy, which corresponded to a difference in pain scores between
ultrasound and control of -1.2 cm on a 10-cm VAS (95% CI -1.9 to -0.6 cm). For
function, we found a trend in favour of ultrasound, which corresponded to a
difference in function scores of -1.3 units on a standardised WOMAC disability
scale ranging from 0 to 10 (95% CI -3.0 to 0.3). Safety was evaluated in two
trials including up to 136 patients; no adverse event, serious adverse event or
withdrawals due to adverse events occurred in either trial.
AUTHORS' CONCLUSIONS: In contrast to the previous version of this review, our
results suggest that therapeutic ultrasound may be beneficial for patients with
osteoarthritis of the knee. Because of the low quality of the evidence, we are
uncertain about the magnitude of the effects on pain relief and function,
however. Therapeutic ultrasound is widely used for its potential benefits on both
knee pain and function, which may be clinically relevant. Appropriately designed
trials of adequate power are therefore warranted
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
The importance of allocation concealment and patient blinding in osteoarthritis trials: a meta-epidemiologic study
No full textOBJECTIVE: To evaluate the association of adequate allocation concealment and
patient blinding with estimates of treatment benefits in osteoarthritis trials.
METHODS: We performed a meta-epidemiologic study of 16 meta-analyses with 175
trials that compared therapeutic interventions with placebo or nonintervention
control in patients with hip or knee osteoarthritis. We calculated effect sizes
from the differences in means of pain intensity between groups at the end of
followup divided by the pooled SD and compared effect sizes between trials with
and trials without adequate methodology.
RESULTS: Effect sizes tended to be less beneficial in 46 trials with adequate
allocation concealment compared with 112 trials with inadequate or unclear
concealment of allocation (difference -0.15; 95% confidence interval [95% CI]
-0.31, 0.02). Selection bias associated with inadequate or unclear concealment of
allocation was most pronounced in meta-analyses with large estimated treatment
benefits (P for interaction < 0.001), meta-analyses with high between-trial
heterogeneity (P = 0.009), and meta-analyses of complementary medicine (P =
0.019). Effect sizes tended to be less beneficial in 64 trials with adequate
blinding of patients compared with 58 trials without (difference -0.15; 95% CI
-0.39, 0.09), but differences were less consistent and disappeared after
accounting for allocation concealment. Detection bias associated with a lack of
adequate patient blinding was most pronounced for nonpharmacologic interventions
(P for interaction < 0.001).
CONCLUSION: Results of osteoarthritis trials may be affected by selection and
detection bias. Adequate concealment of allocation and attempts to blind patients
will minimize these biases
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Full text linkWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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