CLINICAL SCENARIO A 55-year-old man had his serum cholesterol level measured at a
shopping mall 2 months ago. His cholesterol level was elevated and he comes to you, his …

Study Design During the last decade, many studies7–25 assessing the efficacy and safety
of different antithrombotic therapies for the prevention of stroke in AF have been published (…

What rnles of evidence should apply when expert committees meet to generate recommendations
for the clinical management of patients? Should only the thoroughly validated results …

High quality protocols facilitate proper conduct, reporting, and external review of clinical
trials. However, the completeness of trial protocols is often inadequate. To help improve the …

The protocol of a clinical trial serves as the foundation for study planning, conduct, reporting,
and appraisal. However, trial protocols and existing protocol guidelines vary greatly in …

Background The vascular and gastrointestinal effects of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs
(NSAIDs), including selective COX-2 inhibitors (coxibs) and traditional non-steroidal anti-…

CLINICAL SCENARIO You are a general internist who is asked to see a 65-year-old man with
controlled hypertension and a 6-month history of atrial fibrillation resistant to cardioversion…

WITH neither the time nor the resources available to prevent, detect, or treat every disorder
in every patient, which preventive, diagnostic, or therapeutic interventions should take priority…

Background The Randomized Aldactone Evaluation Study (RALES) demonstrated that
spironolactone significantly improves outcomes in patients with severe heart failure. Use of …

Background There is much controversy about the use of computed tomography (CT) for
patients with minor head injury. We aimed to develop a highly sensitive clinical decision rule for …