Stepped wedge design

6 important questions on Stepped wedge design

Explain short the goal of the PREPARATION study.

More old people => more orthopaedic surgeries => not everyone benefits => mortality.
Anaesthesiologist needs to decide about the risks. 

A multidiciplinary meeting can be helpfull in making a good risk-benefit analysis.
Risks? Benefits? Alternatives? Wishes of patient?

=> optimized patient outcome

What is a disadvantage of stepped wedge study?

  • Confounder of time
  • It is really needed that all clusters get the intervention?

Why is justified to cluster in the PREPARATION study? What are cons of using clusters? (3)

  • If one patient gets a meeting => the doctors are aware of the possibility and will also use it, maybe unconciously, in other patients.
  • Not ethical to give one patient the intervention and the other not in the same hospital


Con:
  • Small numbers of clusters
  • Increases false positive significant treatment effect
  • Confounding by specific characteristics of one hospital => like how doctor normally care
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Why is a stepped wedge design in addition to cluster randomisation justified in the PREPARATION study?

  • It gives more statistical power; when you have a limited number of clusters => you also make a comparison within a cluster.
  • Logistics more feasible => introduce the new meeting in the different hospitals
  • Social appeal (ethical) => everyone will get the intervention.

What are logistical challenges for a stepped wedge design?

  • Recruitment can not take too long => because there is a fix period. => everyone needs to be ready because everyone gets the time of the treatment randomized. You don't know when.
  • You can not just extend the period.

What is a big disadvantage of the stepped wedge trial?

Risk of contamination => when are you going to ask the doctors to use the meeting. At inclusion or when. What is the relevance of the transit period?
=> how long should the transition period be?

The question on the page originate from the summary of the following study material:

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