Dear Colleagues,
An interesting question posed by one of our clinical librarians.
If you could share your replies with Terry I should be most grateful.
All good wishes,
Olive
Olive Goddard
Centre and Editorial Manager
Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine
Department of Primary Health Care
Old Road Campus, Headington
Oxford, OX3 7LF
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>>> "Harrison, Terence M" <[log in to unmask]> 09/07/2007 08:26 >>>
Dear Olive,
My enquiry relates to items retrieved from what are commonly known as 'evidence summaries' and their levels of evidence. I refer, here, to sources such as: Best Bets, Clinical Knowledge, POEMS (from Wiley Infotriever), 'EBM Guidelines' (Wiley), and 'BMJ Evidence Updates' (and similar commercially packaged solutions). These all vary in terms of content, transparency, rigour, presentation, etc. One can either ignore them or use them. If the latter, it is often problematic (in my experience) to associate a level of evidence. These sources claim (some more deserving than others) to be evidence-based, but often appear to little more than expert opinion. I have canvassed opinions of other Clinical Librarians on this question, but get mixed views. What are your views as to where these should sit in the evidence-base pyramid (or should I - we - remain perplexed)?
Kind regards,
Terry Harrison
Clinical Librarian,
Health Sciences Library incorporating
The Victorian Mental Health Library,
Royal Melbourne Hospital.
"Pre-eminence in innovative health information delivery"
Phone: (03) 93424091
Fax: (03) 93428615
http://www.mh.org.au/Library
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