Page 26 - Recommendations-for-biostatisticians-in-managing-and-conducting-medical-research-consultations

5.1 To identify the needs and expectations of the

research client

Research clients who are seeking for research consultation services may come from a
different background including their competency in conducting research. Even though
some research clients maybe competent in conducting their own research, they may still
require further assistance. It may be possible for them to seek advice from a biostatistician
on how to conduct an advanced statistical analysis such as disease modelling, for instance.
Meanwhile, it is also possible for other research clients to seek advice from the
biostatistician when they have no or very limited knowledge of the research area; and the
biostatistician will then have to guide them from scratch.

Thus, it is very important for a biostatistician to identify the needs and
expectations of the research client before a biostatistician starts to conduct the
consultation session, since he/she will need to adopt a different approach for
managing and handling it in order to cater for the specific needs and expectations of
the research client, and also to tailor his/her competency and prior experience in
conducting research to the design of a new research proposal. In a previous section,
this e-book/book has recommended the biostatistician to ask three essential questions for
conducting a prior assessment of the research study. The aim for doing this is to enable the
research client to convince the biostatistician that the study has scientific value and is
feasible. This is a very important step before embarking on a biostatistical consultation
because it must be emphasized right from the beginning that a biostatistical consultation
can prove worthless if the study has no scientific value, and/or the methods in conducting
the study are not scientifically valid, and/or not complying with ethical requirements, etc.

Then, the next question is to know the research client expectation by posing few
questions such as “How I can help you?” or “What is your expectation from this
consultation session?”. By knowing the client’s expectation, then the biostatistician can
roughly know how to deliver the consultation and to set up any subsequent consultation
session(s) if necessary. This will then save a lot of time and also ensure that the client’s
expectation(s) can be fulfilled.