Newsletter
SUMMER
Issue 3
Clinical Epidemiology IRG at the
International Shared Decision Making
Conference, Boston 2009
clinical epidemiology
interdisciplinary research group
‘on the basis of scientific evidence...’ Archie Cochrane
The Clinical Epidemiology IRG had a
strong presence at the 5th International
Shared Decision Making Conference in
Boston - four oral presentations.
Stephanie Sivell presented her work on
Bresdex (www.bresdex.com) which
helps women diagnosed with breast
cancer to choose whether to have
lumpectomy or mastectomy. Natalie
Joseph-Williams presented her
systematic review of the measurement
of regret: showing how current scales do
not match the emerging theoretical
constructs. Glyn Elwyn presented work
on the International Patients Decision
Aids Standards Collaboration and on the
theoretical basis for decision support.
He also opened the conference with a
keynote plenary which asked the
question, ‘What is shared decision
making? and why do we care?’
Emma Melbourne presented a poster on
the dyadic OPTION instrument, Cherry-
Ann Waldron presented a poster on risk
communication in cardiovascular
disease, Paulina Bravo presented a
poster on her proposed decision support
for people living with HIV, Michelle
Edwards presented a poster on health
literacy and Marie-Anne Durand’s
poster was on heuristic-based decision
tools in amniodex (www.amniodex.com).
Adrian Edwards launched the second
edition of ‘Shared Decision-Making in
Health Care’ (see title page below)
published by Oxford University Press.
The highlights of the conference were
the following debates: What is the
justification for involving patients in
decisions? Should there be only
justification be on the basis of costs and
effectiveness or should medicine be
predicated on a deeper principle of
respecting individual preferences and
agency? Can we ever leave behind the
legacy of the expected utility theory -
which presumes that humans are
rational, logical calculators - the model
of homo economicus - which integrates
probabilities and util