title: Randomized controlled trials in hospital epidemiology. Sixth annual National Foundation for Infectious Diseases lecture.
abstract: Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) are useful in the evaluation of both new and well-established hospital infection control practices for which the benefit is unproven and not obvious. RCTs are often undertaken to resolve controversies, and many of them have a "negative" or inconclusive outcome. Well-designed RCTs with a negative outcome have the potential for reducing health care costs by identifying widely used preventive measures that are not cost effective. ICPs should appreciate that RCTs have important limitations, may contain serious flaws in design, and are subject to exploitation by pharmaceutical and equipment manufacturers. Knowledge of the principles of RCTs can lead to improved scientific standards for all research--nonrandomized as well as randomized--in hospital epidemiology.
mesh_terms: D002986:Clinical Trials as Topic; D003428:Cross Infection / Q000517:prevention & control*; D004812:Epidemiologic Methods; D004865:Equipment and Supplies, Hospital; D006801:Humans; D011897:Random Allocation; D012107:Research Design