For external validation of diagnostic accuracy study, is a prospective study superior to a retrospective study? What is the reason for the superiority of a prospective design? Avoidance of recall bias? or avoiding sampling bias?
Prospective studies of diagnostic test accuracy have important advantages over retrospective designs.
Prospective studies of diagnostic test accuracy when disease prevalence is low - PubMed (nih.gov)
A prospective study is generally perceived to be more accurate than a retrospective. However, previous research has shown that well-designed retrospective studies are not inferior to perspective. Image-based retrospective studies had less recall bias or missing data than clinical interventional studies. A partial verification bias occurs when not all patients with the condition will be verified by the reference study based on the index test or clinical data. Including all or most patients in a prospective design could lessen partial verification bias. Logistics or surgeon decisions make it difficult to track every patient for reference study. We believe retrospective design will be more beneficial with a large consecutive sample of patients with well-balanced injury characteristics. Choosing a center with the proper logistics and case volume is crucial.