Applicability
The published results applied to the patients participating in the clinical trial.
How similar are those patients to your patient population or your individual patient?
Click on each of the questions below to explore aspects of applicability.
Click on each heading below for more information.
Have you considered the characteristics of the patients in the clinical trial, and the setting of the clinical trial?
- Would your patient have been eligible for the clinical trial?
- If not, what important characteristics are different?
- Would these characteristics make an intervention less effective? More toxic?
- - Ethnicity may be important in drug metabolism and toxicity, as well as prognosis.
- Patient selection may be important for treatment efficacy – consider whether you have access to the diagnostic tests or technology to select patients who will benefit from the intervention.
Is the intervention available in your setting?
- Ask yourself if the intervention is PBS listed or Medicare reimbursed.
- Consider whether the diagnostic technology is available.
- Ensure that medical, dental, or allied health staff have the right training to carry out the intervention safely and effectively.
- Check whether your laboratory can perform the diagnostic test accurately and within a good time frame.
Are the other concurrent treatments and supportive care standard in your setting?
What else did the study incorporate that may not be standard in your environment?
- - Perhaps the intervention required a week-long inpatient stay when this is not feasible in your institution.
- - Maybe an antidepressant treatment was used with intensive counselling interventions that are not available to your patients because of cost.
