Research in general paediatrics

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Abstract
Do district general hospitals have a role? The aim of this leading article is to explore the important topic of research in general paediatrics. The need for research in this field will be reviewed along with where and who should be carrying this out. The role of district general hospitals (DGHs) in research in general paediatrics is discussed. Decision making within medicine has correctly shifted towards evidence based practice. It is important to ensure that in the most common conditions seen in general paediatrics children receive the best treatment. There are still many situations, for example, treatment of acute seizures and sedation for procedures, which have outstanding therapeutic and management questions that need answering through research. The need to encourage research has been acknowledged by the inclusion of a general paediatric section in the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health Annual Meeting in York over the past few years. A review of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) published in Archives of Disease in Childhood from 1982 to 1996 found 249 RCTs, with only 28% being classified as being within the area of general paediatrics.1 This suggests that much of our research potential is concentrated on rare conditions and neglects the more common general paediatrics. Research is often thought of as non-clinical and clinical research. Non-clinical research, such as molecular and animal studies, is usually performed in academic laboratory based facilities and gives us the ideas and theories that are carried through into our clinical research. Clinical research, such as that into new drug therapies, is usually carried out initially in healthy adult volunteers and then tested in the paediatric patient population.2,3 Therefore wherever there is a paediatric population of patients there is the potential for research. General paediatricians in DGHs have participated in large multicentre trials, for …