Evidence-based Medicine Test Questions

1. A certain cohort study showed that patients in group 1 had a crude Relative Risk of death of 1.5 compared to patients in group 2. How do you interpret these results? (circle one)

a. Patients in group 1 had a 50% increase in mortality compared to group 2.

b. Patients in group 1 had 150 times more deaths than group 2.

c. Those who died had 1.5 times the risk of being in group 1 as those who lived.

d. I don't know/not sure.

2. A certain study showed a Relative Risk of 2.5 when the experimental group was exposed. The confidence interval was (0.79-5.21). How do you interpret these results? (circle one)

a. Since the Relative Risk was right in the middle of the confidence interval, these results can give strong inference to the general population.

b. The Relative Risk in the study had a range of values from 0.79 to 5.21.

c. The confidence interval included 1.0, which means the relative risk in the study population is not statistically significant.

d. I don't know/not sure.

3. A certain test has a positive likelihood ratio of 3. What does this tell you about the test's ability to change your pretest probability to post-test probability? (circle one)

a. The test will make very large changes in the probability of disease if positive.

b. Those with the disease have 3 times the chance of having a positive test compared to those without the disease.

c. The test will make no change in the probability of disease if positive.

d. Those with a positive test have 3 times the chance of having the disease as those with a negative test.

e. I don't know/not sure

4. A study showed that a certain test had a sensitivity of 0.93. Which of following statements is correct? (circle one)

a. The test found 93% of those who had the disease.

b. In the study, 93% of those without the disease had a positive test.

c. In the study, 7% of those who had a positive test had the disease.

d. I don't know/not sure

5. Identify a Medical Subject Heading (MeSH) term that would NOT be useful in searching the Medline databases for a study about the sensitivity and specificity of a certain disease.

a. Sensitivity and Specificity.

b. Randomized Controlled Trial.

c. Predictive Value of Tests.

d. Cross-Sectional Study

e. I don't know/not sure

6. Please list 4 criteria that you would use to assess the validity of the methodology used in a study to determine the sensitivity and specificity of a diagnostic test. You may use any handy lists that you would normally use to evaluate an article.

a.

b.

c.

d.

7. Please list 5 criteria that you would use to assess the validity of the methodology used in a study to determine the effectiveness of a new therapy or medication. You may use any handy lists that you would normally use to evaluate an article.

a.

b.

c.

d.

e.