There are some situations where the randomization procedure is not possible within the study setting considering the contamination of study interventions among the study participants. In such conditions, if one hospital is used for the experimental group and another hospital for the control group, the study has no randomization procedure for allocating the study participants to either group. Can this study design be a randomized controlled trial or does it needs to be called a non-randomized controlled trial? Kindly share your expertise.
The classic alternative to randomization is a quasi-experimental design. This would include using two separate sites for your treatment delivery, but the obvious problem is introducing bias due to the differences between the two sites.
Thank you very much Prof David for the clarification. Can the Quasi-experimental design be reported as a Non-randomized controlled trial? David L Morgan
Yes, you can think of a quasi-experimental design as a non-randomized controlled trial. Another name for this kind of design is a non-equivalent control group. There is quite a large literature on quasi-experimental designs.
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