MEDICAL RESEARCH

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MEDICAL RESEARCH

• AN INTRODUCTION

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WHY DO RESEARCH ?

• Excitement of making new discoveries
• Pursuit of prestige
• Driven by passion
• In search of recognition
• Publish and succeed

3
BENEFITS FROM RESEARCH

• Develops a critical attitude
• Chance to study subject in depth
• Learns to use the library
• Develops critical faculty
• Acquires special skills and interests
• Makes friends and learns from others
• Leads to higher degree

4
PROCESS OF DISCOVERY

• Determined pursuit of a central idea
• EDWARD JENNER
• WATSON AND CRICK
• Aided by technology revolution
• Serendipity
• Blind luck

5
NATURE OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH

• Systematic enquiry and accumulation of evidence
  leading to new knowledge
• Meticulous experimentation and recording of new
  facts
• Observations and systematisation of facts
• Analysis of facts and formulation of new
  theories

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SCIENTIFIC METHOD

• Objective observation
• Logical reasoning
• Formulation of hypothesis fitting the data
• Predict other possibilities
• Repeat the experiments

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INDUCTIVE REASONING

• Direction is from the particular to the general
• Observations or experiments lead to hypothesis
• Heliocentric theory of Copernicus
• Keplers laws of planetary motion

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INDUCTIVE REASONING

• Observation
• All ravens observed, are black
• Conclusion
• All ravens observed and to be observed are black
• Information provided in the conclusion goes far
  beyond the information in the starting premise

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DEDUCTIVE REASONING

• One statement follows the other as a consequence
• Final prediction is verifiable
• Observations support the hypothesis or theory
• Prediction from Einsteins theory of relativity
  verified during solar eclipse

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DEDUCTIVE REASONING

• Premises
• All rabbits are mammals
• All mammals have kidneys
• Conclusion
• All rabbits have kidneys
• Information contained in the premises are true
• The conclusion cannot be false

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MEDICAL RESEARCH

• Experiments
• Hypothesis
• Verification
• Deduction
• Both inductive and hypothetico- deductive in
  nature

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KARL POPPER

• Real role of the scientist is to device
  experiments aimed at refuting a theory
• Theory believed to be true till it has been
  refuted by an experiment

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HISTORY OF MEDICAL RESEARCH

• I7th century
• William Harvey and circulation
• Thomas Sydenham and clinical observations
• 18th century
• James Lynd and lime treatment of Scurvy
• Edward Jenner and Vaccination
• 19th century
• Claude Bernard and physiology
• Louis Pasteur and microboiology
• Robert Koch and tuberculosis

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RESEARCH IN 20th CENTURY

• Most phenomenal advances
• Medical Research Council- Britain
• Rockefeller Foundation US
• National Institute of Health USA
• Indian council of Medical Research

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TWENTIETH CENTURY

• The discovery of structure of DNA
• the most profound medical discovery of the century

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HISTORY OF EPIDEMIOLOGY

• John Graunt - bills of mortality
• 16 century
• William Farr annual mortality bills
• John Snow London Cholera
• 18 century
• Richard Doll and Bradford Hill- smoking and
  cancer
• 20 century

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EPIDEMIOLOGY IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

• Focus on lifestyle diseases
• Large scale cohort studies
• Randomised clinical trials
• Case control studies
• Emergence of clinical epidemiology

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TYPES OF MEDICAL RESEARCH

• Basic research
• Applied research
• Descriptive
• Analytical
• Quantitative research
• Qualitative research

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MEDICAL RESEARCH IN THE NEW MILLENNIUM

• The age of molecular medicine?
• Unique confluence of molecular biology and
  information technology
• Emergence of a biotechnology revolution