review article NEJM

Clinicians are challenged to stay informed of new and changing medical literature. To facilitate knowledge updates and synthesis of practice-changing information, a group of 6 internists reviewed the titles and abstracts in the 7 outpatient general internal medicine journals with the highest impact factors and relevance to outpatient internal medicine physicians: New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), Lancet, Annals of Internal Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), JAMA Internal Medicine, British Medical Journal (BMJ), and Public Library of Science (PLoS) Medicine...

BACKGROUND: In theory, efficient design of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) involves randomization algorithms that control baseline variable imbalance efficiently, and corresponding analysis involves pre-specified adjustment for baseline covariates. This review sought to explore techniques for handling potentially influential baseline variables in both the design and analysis phase of RCTs. METHODS: We searched PubMed for articles indexed "randomized controlled trial", published in the NEJM, JAMA, BMJ, or Lancet for two time periods: 2009 and 2014 (before and after updated CONSORT guidelines)...

OBJECTIVE: Studies with authors trained in research methods are of higher quality than those without. We examined inclusion of authors with master's or doctoral degrees incorporating advanced research methods training on original research articles in high-impact journals, investigating differences between journals and by first-author sex. METHODS: Using all original research articles from 1 issue of The New England Journal of Medicine ( NEJM ), Journal of the American Medical Association ( JAMA ), Annals of Internal Medicine ( Annals ), and JAMA-Internal Medicine/Archives of Internal Medicine ( Archives ) every alternate month, February 1994 to October 2016, we assessed the prevalence of articles listing authors with master's/doctoral research degrees and its adjusted associations with time of publication, journal, and first-author sex via multivariable logistic regression models (accounting for number of authors, study type, specialty/topic, and continent and for interactions between journal and time of publication, study type, and continent)...

The expansive scope of general internal medicine makes it difficult to identify practice-changing medical literature. Clinical updates can be facilitated by synthesizing relevant articles and implications for practice. Six internal medicine physicians reviewed the titles and abstracts in the 7 general internal medicine clinical outpatient journals with the highest impact factor and relevance to the internal medicine outpatient physician: New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), Lancet, Annals of Internal Medicine, Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), JAMA-Internal Medicine, British Medical Journal (BMJ), and Public Library of Science (PLoS) Medicine...

BACKGROUND: Confidence intervals (CIs) offer a complete and intuitive presentation of results and are more informative than P-values. The current prevalence of CI reporting in the dermatology literature has not been discussed. OBJECTIVES: To evaluate CI reporting prevalence in the dermatology literature, factors predicting reporting and to compare CI reporting in the dermatology literature with dermatology research in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). METHODS: MEDLINE was queried for trials and observational studies published from 2007 to 2017 in six dermatology journals with varying impact factors: British Journal of Dermatology, Journal of Investigative Dermatology, JAMA Dermatology, Journal of the American Academy of Dermatology, European Journal of Dermatology and Journal of Cosmetic Dermatology...

BACKGROUND: Bradford's law of scattering defines an exponentially diminishing return when extending a search for references in journals and can be used to identify the "core" journals in a field. The purpose of this study was to identify the core journals of pediatric surgery. METHODS: With Institutional Review Board approval, we developed bibliometric profiles for the top academically productive pediatric surgeons in the United States. These profiles included the total number of publications, journals in which those authors published their manuscripts, and identification of all articles cited by those surgeons, along with the journals those references were drawn from...

BACKGROUND: Parkinson's disease (PD), the second most common neurodegenerative disease, has serious clinical effects. Research on PD is increasing, but the quantity and quality of this research have not been reported. METHODS: To analyze the most-cited articles on PD and provide information about developments in this field, we searched for articles in the Web of Science for the keyword "Parkinson*" in the title. We selected the 100 most-cited articles and evaluated information including citation number, publication time, journal, impact factor, authors, original country, institution of corresponding author, and study type...

BACKGROUND: The atrocities in Syria have been covered in the four general medical weekly journals in the USA and the UK. Medical journal articles addressing political determinants of public health have rightly described and criticised the international community's failure to enforce humanitarian law while urging global bodies of power to ensure protection of civilians and civilian infrastructure and medical services. Discussions of the political influences on health of people in the occupied Palestinian territory (West Bank and Gaza Strip) seem to be considered politically out-of-bounds by some medical journals...

The goal in selecting these recent articles was to help identify literature that may change the clinical practice of women's health for internists. Articles were identified by reviewing the high-impact medical and women's health journals, national guidelines, ACP JournalWise, and NEJM Journal Watch. Cardiovascular (CV) disease remains the leading cause of death in women. The emphasis of this review is on identifying opportunities for CV risk reduction to prevent disease and on early identification of women with preexisting atherosclerotic disease to allow for early initiation of medical treatment...

OBJECTIVE: We have proposed that three scientific criteria are important for the ethical justification of randomized clinical trials (RCTs): (1) they should be designed around a clear hypothesis; (2) uncertainty should exist around that hypothesis; (3) that uncertainty should be as established through a systematic review. We hypothesized that the majority of a sample of recently published RCTs would not explicitly incorporate these criteria, therefore rendering them potentially unjustified on scientific grounds...

Osteoporotic vertebral compression fractures (OVCFs) are a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in the United States and worldwide, with estimates of 750,000 to 1.5 million occurring annually. As the elderly population continues to increase, the incidence of OVCFs will continue to rise, as will the morbidity and mortality associated with this condition. Vertebral augmentation (VA) was almost universally accepted as the appropriate treatment modality prior to 2 sham trials published in 2009 by the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM)...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: We set out to revisit and comment on the evidence surrounding a popular figure published in the New England Journal of Medicine (2002), which suggests that the incidence of immune-mediated diseases, including multiple sclerosis (MS), is increased by reduced exposure to infections. METHODS: Commentary. RESULTS: We found that, to date (May 2017), this influential article has been cited >2000 times. However, on close investigation of the figure, we noticed some problems...

BACKGROUND: Healthcare policy is often determined by well-designed studies most often published in high-impact medical journals. However, concern about the presence of publication bias against lower-extremity arthroplasty-related studies has called into question some of the validity of certain reports. There are only a few studies investigating the presence of the bias in high-impact medical journals against lower-extremity arthroplasty intervention, particularly in the Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA), New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM), and the Lancet...

There has been a disagreement amongst experimentalists and between experimentalists and theoreticians as to the gas-phase structure of dimethyl peroxide. We have investigated this problem with high-level CCSD(T)-F12 and MRCI procedures. There can be no doubt anymore that, at the minimum of the potential energy surface, the COOC fragment has a trans-structure. The dynamical structure of the molecule can, however, be different and be explained by the very slow torsional motion. We have analysed the dynamical structure using numerical wavefunctions of the torsional motion and a fully optimized potential curve of MP2/aug-cc-pVTZ quality...

WHAT IS KNOWN AND OBJECTIVE: Study design and statistical methods have become core components of medical research, and the methodology has become more multifaceted and complicated over time. The study of the comprehensive details and current trends of study design and statistical methods is required to support the future implementation of well-planned clinical studies providing information about evidence-based medicine. Our purpose was to illustrate study design and statistical methods employed in recent medical literature...

OBJECTIVE: To examine whether primary reports of randomized clinical trials (RCTs) in six high-impact, general medical journals reported (1) whether or not a Data Monitoring Committee/Data and Safety Monitoring Board (DMC/DSMB) was used and (2) the composition of the responsibilities of the reported DSMB/DMCs. STUDY DESIGN AND SETTING: Systematic review of RCTs published in 2014 in Annals of Internal Medicine, BMJ, NEJM, JAMA, JAMA Internal Medicine, and Lancet...

PURPOSE: Missing data are a major problem in the analysis of data from randomised trials affecting power and potentially producing biased treatment effects. Specifically focussing on quality of life outcomes, we aimed to report the amount of missing data, whether imputation was used and what methods and was the missing mechanism discussed from four leading medical journals and compare the picture to our previous review nearly a decade ago. METHODS: A random selection (50 %) of all RCTS published during 2013-2014 in BMJ, JAMA, Lancet and NEJM was obtained...

AIM: To evaluate the reported use of data monitoring committees (DMCs), the frequency of interim analysis, prespecified stopping rules and early trial termination in neonatal randomised controlled trials (RCTs). METHODS: We reviewed neonatal RCTs published in four high-impact general medical journals, specifically looking at safety issues including documented involvement of a DMC, stated interim analysis, stopping rules and early trial termination. We searched all journal issues over an 11-year period (2003-2013) and recorded predefined parameters on each item for RCTs meeting inclusion criteria...

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Arthroscopic partial meniscectomy (APM) has been demonstrated to be effective when performed in the appropriately indicated patient. However, a recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) questioned whether or not the procedure actually had any clinical benefit whatsoever. Despite being a prospective, Level 1, randomized study, there are several aspects of the study that must be taken into consideration when interpreting the findings, including but not limited to the patient selection criteria, limited sample size, and lack of information regarding meniscal tear patterns...