Talk Evidence

Talk Evidence - re-hospitalistion for covid-19, remote hypertension intervention

The evidence geekery continues, and this week Helen Macdonald and Duncan Jarvies are joined by Joe Ross, The BMJ's US research editor, and professor of medicine and public health at Yale. This week we pick up on a preprint in medRxiv, which has been attracting attention on social media - it tries to look at the longer term effects of covid hospitalisation. Joe explains why he thinks propensity matching can be summarised as "doing your best". Finally, as more and more care moves remotely, we discuss a trial on a digital intervention to help manage poorly controlled hypertension remotely. Reading list: Epidemiology of post-COVID syndrome following hospitalisation with coronavirus: a retrospective cohort study https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.01.15.21249885v1.full.pdf Home and Online Management and Evaluation of Blood Pressure (HOME BP) using a digital intervention in poorly controlled hypertension: randomised controlled trial

https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.m4858

Talk Evidence - Lateral flow tests update, not the best public health approach

In this episode of Talk Evidence, Jon Deeks, professor of biostatistics at the University of Birmingham, returns to the pod with an update on lateral flow tests - and why the government plan for using them in asymptomatic screening for covid-19 doesn't follow the science. We're also joined by Allyson Pollock, clinical professor of public health at Newcastle University, and author of a recent editorial in The BMJ about asymptomatic transmission of SARS-CoV-2. She explains why she thinks supporting social isolation is the missing piece of our approach to tackling the pandemic. Covid-19 INNOVA testing in schools: don’t just test, evaluate https://blogs.bmj.com/bmj/2021/01/12/covid-19-innova-testing-in-schools-dont-just-test-evaluate/ Asymptomatic transmission of covid-19

https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m4851

A (non-systematic) evidence review of 2020

As 2021 hoves into view, we look back at a year of extraordinary evidence. Helen Macdonald is joined by Joe Ross, one of The BMJ's research editors, as well as a researcher at Yale.

They discuss the way in which clinical pre-prints have become an important part of the research ecosystem, especially during the pandemic, and pick up on some of the non-coronavirus things you might have missed in the deluge of data.

Talking Christmas evidence - how Christmas research is chosen

If you've had time to digest this year's Christmas edition of The BMJ, you might have wondered how those papers get into The BMJ. Well in this Talk Evidence podcast, Helen Macdonald, UK research editor at The BMJ talks to two of her research team colleagues, John Fletcher and Tim Feeney, as they talk through why they chose their favourite papers. Toxicological analysis of George’s marvellous medicine https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m4467 Does medicine run in the family—evidence from three generations of physicians in Sweden https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m4453 The time to act is now

https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m4143

Talk evidence covid-19 update - poor public messaging, and vaccine approval data

The vaccines are being rolled out - but approval is still on an emergency basis, and the evidence underpinning those decisions is only just becoming available for scrutiny. In this podcast we talk to Baruch Fischhoff, professor at Carnegie Mellon University and expert on public health communication about how that messaging should be done. Peter Doshi, associate editor at The BMJ, and vaccine regulation researcher also joins us to talk about the data now released on the vaccine trials - what questions does it raise, and what are the next steps for researching safety.

For more on The BMJ's covid-19 coverage www.bmj.com/coronavirus

Talk evidence covid-19 update - uncertainty in treatment, uncertainty in prevention

Uncertainty abounds - even as we get better data on treatments, with the big RCTs beginning to report, and new trials on masks, the evidence remains uncertain, in both the statistical realm (confidence intervals crossing 0) and in what to do in the face of that continuing lack of clear effect. As always Helen Macdonald and Duncan Jarvies are looking at the evidence, and this week are joined by John Brodersen, professor of general practice at the University of Copenhagen. Helen talks to Bram Rochwerg, methodology lead on the WHO treatment guidelines for covid, about why their latest review has stopped recommending remdesivir for covid-19 treatment. John tells us about the Danmask study - what question it was actually trying to answer. We also discuss the ways in which there is a tendency to express certainty where there is none, and why distrusting simple solutions to complex problems is a good rule of thumb. Reading list: A living WHO guideline on drugs for covid-19 https://www.bmj.com/content/370/bmj.m3379 Covid-19’s known unknowns https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m3979 Effectiveness of Adding a Mask Recommendation to Other Public Health Measures to Prevent SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Danish Mask Wearers

https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-6817

Talk evidence covid-19 update - talking risk, remdesivir, and relevant research

In this talk evidence covid-19 update, we’re taking on risk - how do you figure out your individual risk of dying from the disease? Try QCovid, but remember that it’s figuring out your risk back in April. When it comes to talking about risk, very few people actually engage with the number, so Alex Freeman from the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication at the University of Cambridge joins us to describe their research into more effective ways of presenting it. Huseyin Naci, from the London School of Economics, returns to the podcast to talk to us about the problems of pulling all the trial data together, and where covid-19 has made people work together most effectively in tackling that issue. Reading list; Living risk prediction algorithm (QCOVID) for risk of hospital admission and mortality from coronavirus 19 in adults https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m3731 Repurposed antiviral drugs for COVID-19 –interim WHO SOLIDARITY trial results https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.10.15.20209817v1 Producing and using timely comparative evidence on drugs: lessons from clinical trials for covid-19

https://www.bmj.com/content/371/bmj.m3869.full

Talk Evidence covid-19 update - antigen testing and developing non drug evidence

In this Talk Evidence covid-19 update, Jon Deeks, professor of biostatistics at the University of Birmingham gives us an update on testing technology. Will the point of care tests make a different to big live events, and how research and regulation need to change to tame the testing wild west.

Paul Glasziou, professor of evidence based practice at at Bond University has set up a new collaboration to try and get better at creating evidence for non-drug/vaccine control of pandemics - and ponders why we're good at drug research, but terrible at other kinds.