Measuring the success of blinding in placebo-controlled trials: should we be so quick to dismiss it?
Measuring the success of blinding in placebo-controlled trials: should we be so quick to dismiss it?
'Blinding' involves concealing knowledge of which trial participants received the interventions from participants themselves and other trial personnel throughout the trial. Blinding reduces bias arising from the beliefs and expectations of these groups. It is agreed that where possible, blinding should be attempted, for example by ensuring that experimental and control treatments look the same. However, there is a debate about if we should measure whether blinding has been successful, this manuscript will discuss this controversy, including the benefits and risks of measuring blinding within the randomised controlled trial.
Blinding, Masking, Measuring, Reporting guidelines, Trials
176-181
Webster, Rebecca K
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Bishop, Felicity
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Collins, Gary S
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Evers, Andrea W M
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Hoffmann, Tammy
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Knottnerus, J André
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Lamb, Sarah E
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Macdonald, Helen
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Madigan, Claire
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Napadow, Vitaly
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Price, Amy
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Rees, Jonathan L
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Howick, Jeremy
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July 2021
Webster, Rebecca K
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Bishop, Felicity
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Collins, Gary S
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Evers, Andrea W M
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Hoffmann, Tammy
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Knottnerus, J André
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Lamb, Sarah E
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Macdonald, Helen
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Madigan, Claire
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Napadow, Vitaly
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Price, Amy
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Rees, Jonathan L
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Howick, Jeremy
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Webster, Rebecca K, Bishop, Felicity, Collins, Gary S, Evers, Andrea W M, Hoffmann, Tammy, Knottnerus, J André, Lamb, Sarah E, Macdonald, Helen, Madigan, Claire, Napadow, Vitaly, Price, Amy, Rees, Jonathan L and Howick, Jeremy
(2021)
Measuring the success of blinding in placebo-controlled trials: should we be so quick to dismiss it?
Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, 135, .
(doi:10.1016/j.jclinepi.2021.02.022).
Abstract
'Blinding' involves concealing knowledge of which trial participants received the interventions from participants themselves and other trial personnel throughout the trial. Blinding reduces bias arising from the beliefs and expectations of these groups. It is agreed that where possible, blinding should be attempted, for example by ensuring that experimental and control treatments look the same. However, there is a debate about if we should measure whether blinding has been successful, this manuscript will discuss this controversy, including the benefits and risks of measuring blinding within the randomised controlled trial.
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Webster2021 measuring success of blinding in placebo RCTs
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Accepted/In Press date: 24 February 2021
e-pub ahead of print date: 1 March 2021
Published date: July 2021
Additional Information:
Funding Information:
This work was partly supported by the University of Oxford Humanities Division REF Support Fund provided funding for part of this project (awarded to JH and RW), a VICI grant from the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) (Number: 45316004), and a European Research Council Consolidator Grant (ERC2013-CoG-617700) (awarded to AWME). VN was supported by the National Institutes of Health, National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (R01- AT007550, R61/R33-AT009306, P01-AT009965), and the National Institute of 16 Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (R01- AR064367). GSC was supported by the NIHR Biomedical Research Centre, Oxford and Cancer Research UK (grant C49297/A27294). TH is supported by a National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia Senior Research Fellowship. None of the funders played any role in the study
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier Inc.
Copyright:
Copyright 2021 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
Keywords:
Blinding, Masking, Measuring, Reporting guidelines, Trials
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 448850
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/448850
ISSN: 0895-4356
PURE UUID: b411b44c-0ad9-44b4-9e0b-fab94a7adef2
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Date deposited: 06 May 2021 16:34
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 02:56
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Contributors
Author:
Rebecca K Webster
Author:
Gary S Collins
Author:
Andrea W M Evers
Author:
Tammy Hoffmann
Author:
J André Knottnerus
Author:
Sarah E Lamb
Author:
Helen Macdonald
Author:
Claire Madigan
Author:
Vitaly Napadow
Author:
Amy Price
Author:
Jonathan L Rees
Author:
Jeremy Howick
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