Blinded case-control study of the relationship between human coronavirus NL63 and Kawasaki syndrome

Samuel R Dominguez1, Marsha S Anderson, Mary P Glodé

  • 1Department of Pediatrics, The Children's Hospital, University of Colorado Health Science Center, Denver, CO, USA.

Related Concept Videos

Blinding01:11

Blinding

Blinding is a commonly used method of not telling participants which treatment a subject is receiving. Blinding is a critical part of a randomized control trial or RCT. It reduces the bias that affects the results. In an RCT, blinding is used in the form of a placebo. A placebo effect occurs when untreated subjects falsely believe they have received the treatment and report improved symptoms. A placebo or a dummy treatment is administered to subjects to negate the bias caused by such an effect.
Acute Coronary Syndrome III: Diagnostic Studies01:30

Acute Coronary Syndrome III: Diagnostic Studies

Diagnosing acute coronary syndrome or ACS begins with a thorough patient history. Notable symptoms include central, crushing chest pain radiating to the left arm, neck, jaw, or back, along with shortness of breath, sweating (diaphoresis), nausea, vomiting, dizziness, and palpitations.It is crucial to note any history of cardiac illnesses and assess risk factors, including age, gender, smoking, hypertension, diabetes, hyperlipidemia, and a sedentary lifestyle.During physical examination, vital...
Blind Procedures02:07

Blind Procedures

Ideally, the people who observe and record the children’s behavior are unaware of who was assigned to the experimental or control group, in order to control for experimenter bias. Experimenter bias refers to the possibility that a researcher’s expectations might skew the results of the study. Remember, conducting an experiment requires a lot of planning, and the people involved in the research project have a vested interest in supporting their hypotheses. If the observers knew which child was...
Controls in Experiments01:13

Controls in Experiments

When conducting an experiment, it is crucial to have control to reduce bias and accurately measure the dependent variables. It also marks the results more reliable. Controls are elements in an experiment that have the same characteristics as the treatment groups but are not affected by the independent variable. By sorting these data into control and experimental conditions, the relationship between the dependent and independent variables can be drawn. A randomized experiment always includes a...