Clinical significance is the importance of the research findings. How will it affect the clinical care being provided or how will it affect the clinical decision that needs to be made for care? While statistical significance is the knowledge that the results were based on facts and the interventions performed and not by chance or an accident that happened (Melnyk, & Fineout-Overholt, 2018). The extent to which random errors in a study will affect it, is reported by using the statistical significance which is represented by p values (Melnyk, & Fineout-Overholt, 2018). When the clinical and statistical significance of a study is not understood, it can lead to misleading reports of the study results and the effects of the study. For instance, with clinical significance, if a study does not randomly assign participants to a particular group, there is a possibility that a lot of sick people could be on one group by chance and that will affect the results of the study (Melnyk, & Fineout-Overholt, 2018).
On the other hand, the statistical significance which is used to determine fact or chance, accepts or rejects the hypothesis, that is, what the author believes will happen. For instance, when an author compares two groups stating that the administration of pain medication to the intervention group and a placebo to the control group, stating that the medication will make a difference. The null hypothesis will be that it will not make a difference. Hence, the p value is used to determine the statistical significance. When the p value is small with large samples, it can lead to the study being reported as statistically significant but clinically insignificant while large p values with small sample sizes can be clinically significant and reported as statistically insignificant (Melnyk, & Fineout-Overholt, 2018).
When a study is clinically significant, it helps to improve the medical, physical, emotional and social aspects of care for a patient. It includes both the objective effects such as function, the duration of the illness and how long life is prolonged and the subjective effects refers to the improvement in their attitude, mood, and wellbeing, decrease in pain and increased comfort. Even though statistical significance does not mean clinical significance but it leads to the improvement in the care of the patient, therefore, in a DPI project, researchers and clinicians should not discount either but should pay attention to both to improve the outcome for the patient to decrease the chances of reporting a biased study (Sharma, 2021).
References:
Melnyk, B. M., & Fineout-Overholt, E. (2018). Evidence-based practice in nursing & healthcare: A guide to best practice. LWW.
Sharma, H. (2021). Statistical significance or clinical significance? A researcher’s dilemma for appropriate interpretation of research results. Saudi Journal of Anaesthesia, 15(4), 431.
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