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Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research 1 Finnish Office for Health Care Technology Assessment INTRODUCTION In August 1999, a report on the assessment of telemedicine applications was prepared jointly by the Finnish Office for Health Care Technology Assessment (FinOHTA) and the Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research (AHFMR) on behalf of the International Network of Agencies for [...] Once again, studies meeting selection criteria are listed and discussed in terms of the clinical area of the application, the strength of evidence presented and the conclusions reached. [...] Judgments on the quality of the studies took account of factors such as numbers and selection of subjects, adequacy of description of interventions and methods of analysis, presentation and analysis of data, and relevance of the conclusions to the analysis. [...] Table 2: Levels of scientific evidence Level Strength Type of Conditions of Highest (I) to of evidence study design scientific rigour* Lowest (IX) I Good Meta-analysis of randomized Analysis of patient individual controlled trials data Meta-regression Different techniRues of analysis Absence of heterogeneity Quality of the studies II Large sample randomized Assessment of statistical power controll [...] The first followed the approach taken in the INAHTA review and considered the studies in terms of area of application, objectives, approach taken, the setting and results and conclusions, including any economic analysis.