Managing complexity: Evidence and real world impact
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Transcript of Managing complexity: Evidence and real world impact
Managing complexity: Evidence and real world impact
Soo Downe
Health Research With Real Impact ConferenceUCLanWednesday 15th May, 2013 With thanks to women and families for permission to use the photographs
What complexity is not…• Random• Complicated• Chaotic• Predictable• Linear
The nature of linear evidence….
• Theory-practice gap
• ‘Ivory towers’ and real life…
On the high ground, manageable problems lend themselves to solution through the application of research method and theory…
In the swampy lowland, messy confusing problems defy technical solution.. [these are]…the problems of greatest human concern’
Schon 1983 p14
… a tale of two techniques
•Routine electronic fetal monitoring, low risk women
•Vaginal Breech Birth
Electronic Fetal Monitoring
Date of introduction: 1960s
Dates of trials: 1976-1993
Nine trials (of 13), 18,561 pregnant women, 18,695 infants in both high- and low-risk pregnancies, seven clinical centers in the United States, Europe, and Australia
Electronic Fetal Monitoring
Findings: Statistically significant decrease in neonatal seizures (relative risk
(RR) 0.51, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.32-0.82), no decrease in cerebral palsy
An increase in the rate of cesarean delivery (RR 1.41, 95% CI 1.23-1.61) and operative vaginal delivery (RR 1.20, 95% CI 1.11-1.30).
NICE 2001
For a woman who is healthy and has had an otherwise uncomplicated pregnancy, intermittent auscultation should be offered and recommended in labour to monitor fetal wellbeing.
…In the active stages of labour, intermittent auscultation should occur after a contraction, for a minimum of 60 seconds, and at least:
Every 15 minutes in the first stage. Every 5 minutes in the second stage.
Although the skills necessary to implement
evidence into obstetrical practice are still
available, evidence based research results do
not seem to be of great importance, when
midwives decide which method to use for
intrapartum FHR monitoring. Hospital
policies and the professional training
received were more important factors. Luyben AG, Gross MM.2001
EFM practice: Switzerland
Term breech presentation
First trial: 1980, second 1983, same centre
Main trial 2088 women 121 centres 26 countries (Hannah et al 2000)
Three trials (2396 participants) included
Primary outcome, term breech trial
Media spin
Evidence based real world impact?(mindlines… illness scripts…chunking…)
• 80 centres, 23 countries. 92.5% changed clinical practice to planned CS for most or all term breech babies.
• 66.3% had no difficulties or concerns with implementing a policy of planned Caesarean section for term breech babies.
• 85.0% indicated that an analysis of relative costs would not affect clinical practice in their setting.
Hogle KL et al 2003
…counter stories
• Local studies of consecutive cases varied:
• from evidence that CS confers benefit (eg Rietberg et al 2003)
• to evidence of no difference (Hellsten et al 2003)
• to evidence of benefit for vaginal breech birth (Sibony et al 2003).
2 year follow up:death or serious morbidity
How these sources interact:the reification of knowledge…
The power of authoritative
knowledge is not that it is
correct, but that it countsJordon B 1997 In: Davis-Floyd and Sargent (eds) Childbirth and Authoritative Knowledge,
University of California Press.
Research with real world impact..
Initial conditions, tipping points and simple rules
• separation– don’t collide with
your flockmates • alignment– go where most of
the others are going• cohesion:– move towards the
middle
Explanatory theories…
• Diffusion of innovation• Theory of planned
behaviour• Technology adoption
theory• Baysian theory…• &etc
Simple rules for evidence based medicine?
Evidence-based medicine (EBM) is the integration of best research evidence with clinical expertise and patient value… when these three elements are integrated, clinicians and patients form (an)…alliance which optimises clinical outcomes and quality of life…’
Sackett et al 2000
Ways of knowing: Best evidenceEpisteme
Science: what is: (theōria)
Ways of knowing: Clinical expertiseTéchnē
Art/technology: bringing into being:
production (poiēsis)
Ways of knowing: ValuesPhronēsis
Practical wisdom:ethics, values
action (praxis)
Evidence that takes account of real world complexity
• Mixed methods
• Participatory Action Research
• Experience based co-design
• Realist research
‘what works, for who, in what context’?
Context + mechanism = outcome
Pawson and Tilley 1997
‘good’ evidence – accounting for ‘initial conditions’: how, when, where, who, as well as ‘what works’
Expertise in complex real world context..
• no longer relies on an analytic principle (rule, guideline, maxim)
• intuitive grasp of each situation - zeroes in on the accurate region of the problem without wasteful consideration of a large range of unfruitful, alternative diagnoses and solutions.
• deep understanding of the total situation. • performance fluid, flexible and highly
proficient.• Uses analytic problem solving where
necessary.
Stories as evidence of values in complex real life practice
‘hearing the moral impulse in others’ stories enables us to become part of their struggle to re-enchant a disenchanted world’. Sylvia Barton p18
Where Bacons origin story for science spoke of the intimate connection of knowledge and power, the feminist critique of science …has spoken of the danger of knowledge without love… Hilary Rose 1994 Love power and knowledge towards a feminist transformation of the sciences. polity press
…Lessons for complex real world research from Francis….