Abstract

One question comes to my memory when I’m thinking in the importance of know and understand the signification of the statistical analysis when a scientific manuscript is reading, and this question comes from many of my students… “Professor we´re doctors (or nurses, technicians, biomedical engineers, microbiologists, etc.), our focus is the patient, so, why we need to dedicate time to learn about statistical analysis and interpretation of it?, we´re so busy to take another task”. As a physician and based on the need to get a clear and simply answer to all my colleagues and students, I use practical examples from the real-life setting and clinical and microbiological experience to let them know why statistical knowledge is pretty important for the healthcare personnel. The most reticent group to learn about biostatistics are physicians; yes, the doctors thinks that numbers, proofs, values and measures aren’t necessaries to their daily duties, and the opposite, represents a waste of time; but the opposite is that nothing is so far from the truth. When we take the decision to use a “gold standard technique” despite other alternatives, when we choose a medication dose, when we prefer use an antibiotic over other, we’re applying biostatistical! all the clinical trials to bring us the knowledge about “superiority”, “equivalence! or “nor inferiority” passed by the statistical control to ensure that the results are not related to the random serendipity.

Authors and Affiliations