A Quick Guide on How to Conduct Medical Research

Marieke M. ter Wee studied Occupational Therapy (BSc) at the Hogeschool van Amsterdam, Health Sciences (MSc) at the VU University of Amsterdam, Epidemiology (postgraduate, MSc) at the VU University Medical Center, and obtained her PhD in Medicine at the VU University Amsterdam. She has worked as a clinical research associate at Quintiles Transnational, and since October 2015 she works as an education coordinator and science lector at the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics of the VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam (as of June 2018: Amsterdam UMC, location VUmc). She helps coordinate and teaches in several courses on methodology and statistics at the school of Medicine. Since May 2017, she also works as a senior researchers at the Department of Rheumatology of the VU University Medical Center. Here research focusses on the impact of inflammatory arthritis on work participation as well as on other patient reported outcomes (PROs). Birgit I. Lissenberg-Witte studied Mathematics (MSc) at the VU University Amsterdam, and obtained her PhD in Mathematical Statistics at the Delft University of Technology. Since November 2010, she works as a scientific researcher at the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics of the VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam (as of June 2018: Amsterdam UMC, location VUmc). Her research focusses on developing new methodology in health science. Besides, she coordinates the requests of medical researchers for statistical help through the statistical helpdesk. Moreover, she works as a statistical consultant with junior and senior medical researchers and physicians, teaches a course on Biostatistics for research master students in the area of cardiovascular diseases and oncology, and is member of the Medical Ethical Review Board of Amsterdam UMC, location VUmc.

1 The start - steps to set-up a research.- 2 Medical statistics - the basics.- 3 Analyzing continuous outcome variables.- 4 Analyzing dichotomous outcome variables.- 5 Analyzing time to event outcome variables.- 6 Varables influencing the association.- 7 To predict or not to predict.-  8 Missing data.- 9 Writing and cirically appraising a scientific paper.