Letter

Methods of assessing medical treatments

BMJ 1994; 309 doi: 10.1136/bmj.309.6956.741 (Published 17 September 1994)
Cite this as: BMJ 1994;309:741.1

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  1. A Fontaine,
  2. P Durieux
  1. Unite d'Evaluation, Hospital Louis Mourier, Faculte X Bichat, Paris, France20Delegation a l'Evaluation, Direction de la Prospective et de l'inormation Medicale, Assistance Publique, Hopitaux de Paris, Paris, France.

    EDITOR, — We agree with Trevor A Sheldon that randomised clinical trials are one of the most important methods of assessing the merit of medical treatments.1 We question, however, whether they can, by themselves, address successfully two critical challenges that Sheldon identifies: “to provide answers to more clinically relevant questions” and “to get the results of research into practice.”

    Quality of care is the extent to which health care is able to achieve those health benefits that science and …

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