Choosing a Research Question: Introduction to Choosing a Research Topic Part 1

My name is John Powers. I'm a senior medical scientist. I work here at NIH. I'm an employee of Leidos Biomedical Research, but I work here as a contractor and support of the collaborative clinical research branch within the divisional -- division of clinical research in the National Institutes of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. So, I know this is one of the earliest talks

that you're getting in the introduction to principles and practice of clinical research course syllabus. And so, what we're going to do today is really cover some topics that will be covered in much greater depth in detail later. But really, what we like to do here is talk about how to choose a research

question and then match that research question to the design of a study. And by design, I mean the actual hypothesis, the people who are -- the types of enrollment criteria in the outcomes. So, the first thing to do here tonight is to actually make the distinction between what we mean by clinical research,

which is what this course is about, and clinical practice. A clinical research designates an activity designed to test hypothesis and allow us to draw conclusions and thereby develop or contribute to generalizable knowledge. So, in clinical research, we are not just treating an individual patient. We are trying to develop general theories or make more broader conclusions.

In clinical practice, on the other hand, we're looking at interventions designed solely to enhance the well-being of an individual person. So, a couple years ago, there was a patient that came in here who's mental status was really not very good. So, this was a gentleman who's out playing golf and was doing great