Physicians' Daily Life and the Scientific Method

Abstract

So far, few physicians have followed the scientific method for answering practical questions they simply do not know the answer of. The scientific method is, in a nutshell, reformulate your question into a hypothesis and try to test this hypothesis against control observations. The goal of this article is to give simple examples of how the scientific method can be implied in a physician's daily life. Of nine unanswered daily questions, four qualified for simple statistical assessments that were very clarifying for the physicians involved. Additional advantages of the scientific method include the following: (1) because the scientific method has been recognized to produce the best evidence you can get from your observations, physicians applying it serve their population in the best possible way; (2) being actively involved in the scientific method is a strong antidote against the hazards of accepting published studies from others with too little scepticism or rejecting them with too much of it. Limitations of the scientific method include (1) type I and II errors; (2) misinterpretations due to different frequency distributions; (3) lack of leisure time on the part of the physicians to write a study protocol; and (4) the risk of a damaged patient-doctor relationship.

Key words: :

• Clinical Trials
• Observational Studies
• Chi-Square Tests
• Clinical Hypotheses
• Scientific Methods
• Medical Statistics

Notes

1. Ordronaux J. The jurisprudence of medicine in relation to the law of contracts, torts and evidence. The Lawbook Exchange, LTD, 1869.