Skip Navigation



eCAM Advance Access published online on September 13, 2007
eCAM, doi:10.1093/ecam/nem085
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow E-letters: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when E-letters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Relf, I.
Right arrow Articles by Pirotta, M.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow Articles by Relf, I.
Right arrow Articles by Pirotta, M.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?


© 2007 The Author(s).
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/2.0/uk/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Review

Blinding Techniques in Randomized Controlled Trials of Laser Therapy: An Overview and Possible Solution

Ian Relf1, Roberta Chow2 and Marie Pirotta1

1Department of General Practice, University of Melbourne, 200 Berkeley Street Carlton 3053, Victoria, and 2Private Medical Practice, NSW, Australia

Low-level laser therapy has evidence accumulating about its effectiveness in a variety of medical conditions. We reviewed 51 double blind randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of laser treatment. Analysis revealed 58% of trials showed benefit of laser over placebo. However, less than 5% of the trials had addressed beam disguise or allocation concealment in the laser machines used. Many of the trials used blinding methods that rely on staff cooperation and are therefore open to interference or bias. This indicates significant deficiencies in laser trial methodology. We report the development and preliminary testing of a novel laser machine that can blind both patient and operator to treatment allocation without staff participation. The new laser machine combines sealed preset and non-bypassable randomization codes, decoy lights and sound, and a conical perspex tip to overcome laser diode glow detection.

Keywords: low-level laser therapy – allocation concealment – treatment blinding

For reprints and all correspondence: Dr Ian Relf, Department of General Practice, University of Melbourne, 200 Berkeley Street Carlton 3053, Victoria, Australia. Tel: 61 3 8344 7276; E-mail: i.relf{at}unimelb.edu.au

Received April 1, 2006; accepted March 9, 2007


Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?




Disclaimer:
Please note that abstracts for content published before 1996 were created through digital scanning and may therefore not exactly replicate the text of the original print issues. All efforts have been made to ensure accuracy, but the Publisher will not be held responsible for any remaining inaccuracies. If you require any further clarification, please contact our Customer Services Department.