BACKGROUND
A growing set of medical information founded on the principles of Evidence-Based Medicine (EBM) is available in the literature and its retrieval and use is growing up too.
Related learning materials are inhomogeneus and the evaluation criteria of the acquired skills may not entirely comply with the contents and methods taught and may not be suited for covering long-term results.
Moreover only few data exist on the full and constant application of the EBM skills in the clinical practice, mainly where healthcare professionals do not operate in an EBM-oriented environment.
OBJECTIVES
Our working hypothesis was that the basic skills of EBM can be readily and quickly learned by health care professionals but can also be easily lost without a facilitating medical background.
METHODS
From 2001 on we set up 6 EBM courses. Average duration was 16.5 hours (min 11, max 28); 38 facilitators (clinicians and medical librarians) and 140 learners (clinicians, nurses, biologists, midwives, etc.) took part in the courses; average learners/facilitators rate was 3.9 (min 2.7 max 5.3). 4 courses were focused on information retrieval, while 2 covered also statistics and epidemiology.
A questionnaire based on the national standard module for ECM was used to assess users' satisfaction.
Multiple choice questionnaires and (in 2 courses) group activities were used to assess skills such as ability to choose the sources for literature research, use effective search strategies and state validity and clinical relevance of single studies.
The same questions have been administered at least one year after the end of the course, together with a questionnaire about further practice of EBM and problems and barriers to implementing EBM in clinical practice. A clinical scenario for evaluation of EBM skills was administered.
RESULTS
140 learners took part in the courses over 165 registered (84.9% full attendance).
Average results for final tests were 87% of correct answers (min 81% max 89%).
User satisfaction proved "excellent" in 3 courses and "good" in the other 3, using a 3 grades scale (1 bad ; 2 good ; 3 excellent).
Long term results analysis is ongoing and will be given.
DISCUSSION
Our results confirm that the interest in EBM is high and that a fast learning process, at least with short-term expectations, can be easily and successfully activated.
The user satisfaction is very high. This may depend on the quality of the teachers but also on the intrinsic interest in the proposed topics. |