A novel use of the Spine Tango registry to evaluate selection bias in patient recruitment into clinical studies: an analysis of patients participating in the Lumbar Spinal Stenosis Outcome Study (LSOS)

摘要

Patients enrolled in clinical studies typically represent a sub-set of all who are eligible, and selection bias may compromise the generalizability of the findings. Using Registry data, we evaluated whether surgical patients recruited by one of the referring centres into the Lumbar Spinal Stenosis Outcome Study (LSOS; a large-scale, multicentre prospective observational study to determine the probability of clinical benefit after surgery) differed in any significant way from those who were eligible but not enrolled.