CONSORT1 Task 3

The author mentions that this study was approved by the “National Health Service South-West 3 Research Ethics Committee (10/H0106/13)” (Betts et al, 2014). This study meets the conduct and procedures that were set by the Consolidated Standard of Reporting Trials (CONSORT) guideline. Diagrams, flow charts, and descripted details and rational for that aligns with the CONSORT guidelines can be obtained online.
I do believe that Betts and his team did a good job setting their inclusion criteria and protecting their subjects. They included “healthy” individuals who had a stable weight and some of whom practiced regular physical activity. They excluded, pregnant and lactating women and, shift workers. Also, many laboratory assessments were done on the participants that tested, cholesterol level, glucose, metabolism and hormone levels.
The authors did not mention what they would do to the participants who were tested to have extremely low glucose level or an extremely high one.
They also did not mention the consequences of having low iron count. This is important because, although participants were deemed healthy, those with either lower/higher sugar levels or low iron count may have been randomly assigned to the fasting group, which may not be beneficial to him/her. Assembly this is covered in the research code of ethics; however, many not be familiar with it, so I do think it is worth mentioning hypothetics in the exclusion criteria.
Another point to make is that if one is already lean and actively, maybe it would not be the greatest idea to advise them to fast; especially if this is something new to them. I understand that this study focus on lean healthy individuals, so I don’t have a suggestion or an alternative way to test the
variables.
Reading the article, I did not get a sense that anyone was coerced into doing this study. Although there was no mention of how informed consent was achieved, I do believe that the participants had full antimony and were treated with respect. It does appear that the participants were all there voluntarily. Evidence of this is noted by the author’s mention of four participants withdrawing from the study. I do not believe that there was any pressure put on the participate to participate in the study. Participants were from all over. They did not attend a university where familiar professors were doing a study, so they felt like they had to join out of principal. They were also under “free-living environment” conditions; no foods were forcefully given to them The authors did not mentioned anyone’s name or give out personal information about the subject; everyone was kept anonymous.