The most under-reported items were concealment of allocation , blinding of patients and outcome assessors , intention to treat and validation of outcomes .
BACKGROUND In the process of conducting a systematic review on interventions for skin lesions due to neuritis in leprosy , we assessed several primary papers with respect to the quality of reporting and methods used in the studies .
Awareness of what constitutes weak points in previously conducted studies may be used to improve the planning , conducting and reporting of future clinical trials .
AIMS To assess the quality of reporting and of methodology  in studies of interventions for skin lesions due to neuritis in leprosy .
A randomised controlled trial comparing Drawtex with standard dressings for exuding wounds.
OBJECTIVE This r and omised controlled clinical trial compared a capillary dressing ( Drawtex , now rebr and ed as Vibriant RCD [ Vibriant Technology Services ] ) with routine practice for exuding wounds greater than 2.5 x 2.5 cm . METHOD The target population was 300 control and 300 test subjects across three sites in the UK , but recruitment difficulties result ed in only 125 patients being evaluable .  Wound progress was recorded by nurses ' perception of the progress of wound healing and by objective digital imaging . In the final analysis digital images were r and omised ( in time order ) and a panel of nurses who were not otherwise involved in the research project grade d the wound 's progress . RESULTS After deconvolution of the data , the subjective ( nurse perception ) method of evaluation determined that the new dressing result ed in wound improvement in 12.7 % more patients than did routine practice , but the blinded assessment method ( based on the digital images ) showed that routine practice was better by 6.6 % . CONCLUSION Evaluation of wound progress is clearly difficult . Human nature makes us favour novelty if we believe it is going to be better . Making interpretation more objective removed that bias and did not demonstrate a significant advantage for the test dressing . The findings suggest that unblinded assessment by trial nurses is unacceptable on its own . Blinded assessment s may miss finer nuances of wound progression , but are likely to be more accurate . The authors suggest that the true result lies somewhere in the middle , with the trial dressing likely to be as effective as , but not more effective than , a st and ard dressing
The most under-reported items were concealment of allocation , blinding of patients and outcome assessors , intention to treat and validation of outcomes .
BACKGROUND In the process of conducting a systematic review on interventions for skin lesions due to neuritis in leprosy , we assessed several primary papers with respect to the quality of reporting and methods used in the studies .
Awareness of what constitutes weak points in previously conducted studies may be used to improve the planning , conducting and reporting of future clinical trials .
AIMS To assess the quality of reporting and of methodology  in studies of interventions for skin lesions due to neuritis in leprosy .