A randomized controlled trial evaluation of a smoking cessation and physical activity intervention delivered via telemedicine in the Norton Sound region of Alaska.

Objectives: Tobacco use disproportionately affects Alaska Native people. Physical activity may aid quitting smoking and provides health benefits. We tested telemedicine-delivered heart health interventions in Alaska's Norton Sound region.

Feedback Loop Failure Modes in Medical Diagnosis: How Biases Can Emerge and Be Reinforced.

Background: Medical diagnosis in practice connects to research through continuous feedback loops: Studies of diagnosed cases shape our understanding of disease, which shapes future diagnostic practice. Without accounting for an imperfect and complex diagnostic process in which some cases are more likely to be diagnosed correctly (or diagnosed at all), the feedback loop can inadvertently exacerbate future diagnostic errors and biases.

Framework: A feedback loop failure occurs if misleading evidence about disease etiology encourages systematic errors that self-perpetuate, compromising future diagnoses and patient care.

Moving outside the board room: A proof-of-concept study on the impact of walking while negotiating.

Purpose: Negotiation is a consequential activity that can exacerbate power differentials, especially for women. While traditional contexts can prime stereotypical gender roles and promote conditions that lead to performance differences, these can be mitigated by context shifts. This proof-of-concept study explores whether an easy-to-apply context shift, moving from seated indoors to walking outside, can help improve the quality of negotiated interactions.

Assignment-Control Plots: A Visual Companion for Causal Inference Study Design.

An important step for any causal inference study design is understanding the distribution of the subjects in terms of measured baseline covariates. However, not all baseline variation is equally important. We propose a set of visualizations that reduce the space of measured covariates into two components of baseline variation important to the design of an observational causal inference study: a propensity score summarizing baseline variation associated with treatment assignment, and prognostic score summarizing baseline variation associated with the untreated potential outcome.

Interruptive Electronic Alerts for Choosing Wisely Recommendations: A Cluster Randomized Controlled Trial.

Objective: To assess the efficacy of interruptive electronic alerts in improving adherence to the American Board of Internal Medicine's Choosing Wisely recommendations to reduce unnecessary laboratory testing.

Materials And Methods: We administered 5 cluster randomized controlled trials simultaneously, using electronic medical record alerts regarding prostate-specific antigen (PSA) testing, acute sinusitis treatment, vitamin D testing, carotid artery ultrasound screening, and human papillomavirus testing. For each alert, we assigned 5 outpatient clinics to an interruptive alert and 5 were observed as a control.