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This page provides some of the basics related to Evidence Based Practice model and the resources used to discover the literature. It is not comprehensive. There are specific guides and resources that will offer greater detail.
- How to apply evidence to practicethe Pharmaceutical Journal
A step-by-step example of how to use research data to make an evidence-based clinical decision.
November 2, 2021 by Shazia Bashir
EBP Resources
- ClinicalKey (Elsevier) This link opens in a new windowClinical overviews, e-books, drug classification overviews and patient education and guidelines.
- Cochrane Library This link opens in a new windowA full text database of high-quality, independent evidence to inform healthcare decision-making. Cochrane and other systematic reviews, clinical trials, and more.
- MEDLINE (EBSCOhost) This link opens in a new windowMedline is the U.S. National Library of Medicine's database of articles in medicine, with indexing and abstracts for the most important peer-reviewed biomedical and health sciences research journals. Links to full text.
- Micromedex This link opens in a new windowMicromedex is currently unavailable. We are working to resolve this issue as soon as possible.
Evidence based information about drugs, toxicology, diseases, acute care, and alternative medicine to support informed research. NOT to be used in clinical settings - Natural Medicines This link opens in a new windowHigh quality, evidence-based information about complementary and alternative therapies.
- PubMed (NU customized)A comprehensive source of journal literature in the life sciences and biomedicine from the National Library of Medicine. Includes selected full text from PubMed Central, and NCBI Bookshelf. PubMed is a free web resource, however this version contains links to Northeastern-subscribed journals that require a login.
Web-based
- TRIPTurning Research Into Practice.Trip is a clinical search engine designed to allow users to quickly and easily find and use high-quality research evidence to support their practice and/or care.
- PubMed Clinical QueriesUse the "Clinical Queries" link to search for a specific clinical study category or to locate systematic reviews. Provides predefined filters for searching PubMed.
Definitions
Systematic Reviews
Address a focused clinical question where review authors systematically search for, identify, select, summarize and critically apraise all of the medical research literature available on a specific topic. Statistical techniques may be used to combine the results of these studies. The authors clearly state the search methods used to locate these studies. It is important to examine the search methods used and decide for yourself if it was broad enough to include all of the relevant studies, and if the studies found were relevant to the clinical question.
Randomized Controlled Clinical Trial (RCT)
An experimental design used for testing the effectiveness of a new medication or a new therapeutic procedure. Individuals are assigned randomly to a treatment group or a control group, and the outcomes are compared. RCT is the most accepted scientific method of determining the benefit of a drug or a therapeutic procedure. It represents the best evidence available, which is integrated into the final decision about the management of a condition by healthcare practitioners in what is called evidence-based healthcare.
Clinical Trial
an experiment performed on human beings in order to evaluate the comparative efficacy of two or more therapies.
Protocol
In the Cochrane Library database, the protocol outlines the question that the review authors are addressing, detailing the criteria against which studies will be assessed for inclusion in the review, and describing how the authors will manage the review process.
Meta-Analysis
When results of individual studies are combined to produce an overall statistic.
Review Article
Brings together information about previously published research on a topic. It provides a critical appraisal of the topic over a period of time. It is helpful in identifying the important literature on a topic. Given the vast amount of scientific literature published, review articles are an excellent tool for researchers wishing to research a topic.