Study Finds Hundreds of Medical Procedures To Be Ineffective

Before any medical product or procedure is adopted, it must undergo clinical trials to evaluate its effectiveness. In a randomized clinical trial, subjects are assigned to two or more groups with some receiving the treatment and others receiving none, or a placebo. By comparing outcomes between the two groups, we should be able to see just how useful a treatment is. The subjects (and in the gold standard, the double-blind trial, the scientists as well) are not told which group they’ve been assigned to, theoretically ensuring that there is no bias in reporting about outcomes.