Guidelines for the correct conduct of clinical research in surgery

Clinical research may be either epidemiological or experimental. Epidemiological (observational) research includes cross-sectional, case-control, and cohort studies and draws attention to associations, which may or may not denote cause and effect. Experimental research may be explanatory, the purpose of which is to advance our knowledge of physiological or pathological events; or it may be pragmatic, the purpose of which is to influence our treatment of patients. All these types of clinical research have their own rules, but underlying the detailed rules are the universal ones of telling the truth and doing no harm.