Saving lives with statistics

Abstract

Abstract Healthcare is awash with numbers, and figuring out what knowledge these numbers might hold is worthwhile in order to improve patient care. Numbers allow for objective mathematical analysis of the information at hand, but while mathematics is objective by design, our choice of mathematical approach in a given situation is not. In prehospital and critical care, numbers stem from a wide range of different sources and situations, be it experimental setups, observational data or data registries, and what constitutes a “good” statistical analysis can be unclear. A well-crafted statistical analysis can help us see things our eyes cannot, and find patterns where our brains come short, ultimately contributing to changing clinical practice and improving patient outcome. With increasingly more advanced research questions and research designs, traditional statistical approaches are often inadequate, and being able to properly merge statistical competence with clinical knowhow is essential in order to arrive at not only correct, but also valuable and usable research results. By marrying clinical knowhow with rigorous statistical analysis we can accelerate the field of prehospital and critical care.

Keywords

• Statistical analysis
• Trauma
• Prehospital care