Clinical Research Oriented Workshop (CROW) Meeting: May 26, 2022

 

Present:   Justine Dee, Juvena Hitt, Ben Littenberg, Charlie MacLean, Jen Oshita, Adam Sprouse-Blum, Connie van Eeghen (7)

 1.                   Warm Up: Jen had a good experience at a workshop/conference related to Implementation Science, but the speech and hearing professional organization declined to participate, losing out on great tools and infrastructure.

2.                   Jen’s Manuscript “Nationally Representative Prevalence of Communication Disabilities Among Community Dwelling, Older Adults in the US.” Jen has had difficulty getting it published. The current theory is that there is no modeling, it is a basic prevalence and descriptive paper comparing older adults with communication disabilities, to those without.  Last rejected by Disability and Health. She is going to submit to Journal of Communication Disorders this round. May be of interest to an epidemiological journal.  Jen’s two questions for the group are:

a.       Intro: Does the framing of the introduction fit and justify publication of this paper, or does it seem to overstate what I am doing?  Is “just prevalence” too lean a topic? Looks at Communication Disabilities (CDs) as a whole, not as many separate conditions/issues.

                                                   i.      Why care: government entities/insurance cos making policy; provider/organization operationalizing better patient care

                                                 ii.      Elderly population is growing, so this issue will grow too

                                               iii.      Good topic; important too

b.       Discussion: Is the comparison of findings to prior literature helpful? Since the comparisons are uneven, I wonder if it is more distracting than helpful.

                                                   i.      Start this section with the third sentence

                                                 ii.      Our study produced different results from the limited comparators, probably due to different measures

1.       Explain the differences, don’t explain similarities

2.       This is an important part of the Discussion section

3.       We note that patients with CDs also have lower access, social supports… and may need additional supports beyond those that specifically address their CDs

c.       Other

                                                   i.      Main message of the paper is in tables and figures.  The two tables are almost the same; can it be one table?  Main message: what is the size of this population and what are the implications for organizations caring for this population. Accommodations vary by CD subgroup, except that they all require documentation. “We need to know what’s out there in order to respond to it.”

                                                 ii.      A target population of 1m people is also large enough to attract attention and invite investment.

                                               iii.      Figures

1.       Recheck numbers

2.       Consider making circle sizes match the proportion of the values they represent

3.       Why Figure 2?  Removes people that have already been identified with cognitive impairment and thereby likely already receiving services. Should the text and figure focus on those that can be helped at the institutional policy level – not high need individuals? Consider reviewing and addressing only in the results section.  Match to the main message and stay consistent.

                                               iv.      Consider tests of significance between subgroups

3.                   Next week:  TBD

Recorded by: CvE