A System for Rapidly Yet Rigorously Evaluating the Quality of Randomized Controlled Trials

The July-August 2023 issue of the Journal of Clinical Psychopharmacology features a helpful tutorial written by Drs. Eric G. Smith and Hannah L. Grigorian. Their article is titled “A System for Rapidly Yet Rigorously Evaluating the Quality of Randomized Controlled Trials.”  The article should be of particular interest to busy clinicians, researchers, and trainees, who must grapple with the never-ending task of keeping up with the medical literature.

In this podcast accompanying the article, Dr. Smith provides an overview of criteria that can be used to assess various aspects of trials, including blinding of participants and study personnel, sample size, follow-up, analysis plans, and effect sizes.

Dr. Smith is a psychiatrist and clinical and health services researcher at the VA Bedford Healthcare System, Bedford, Massachusetts, and Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Population and Quantitative Health Sciences at the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School. Dr. Grigorian is a psychology research fellow at the VA Bedford Healthcare System.