Evidence-based public health--what level of competence is required? Gray JA.
Journal of Public Health Medicine. 19(1):65-8, 1997 Mar.
Abstract:
BACKGROUND: Increasing prominence is being given to the use of best current
evidence in decision-making, both in clinical practice and health care
management and purchasing. Public health is regarded as a specialty in which
evidence-based decision-making may be taken for granted, partly because
epidemiology is the principal basic science on which public health has
developed. To practise evidence-based decision-making requires both
organizations that have systems for finding and appraising evidence and
professionals who are skilled in searching, appraising, storing and using
knowledge.
METHODS: A workshop was organized which posed a challenge for participants
based on the assumption that a public health specialist could face hostile
examination by a lawyer in court on their abilities to find and appraise
best current evidence. The findings from this workshop were t ested at a
second workshop in London. Participants were principally public health
specialists from the United Kingdom.
RESULTS: Participants were able to identify the core skills that were
required for public health specialists and the resources that the individual
professional needed to practise evidence-based decision-making. It was also
obvious that there was a gap between the level of competence required and
the level of competence that many public health professionals actually had.
There was also a gap between the resources that were needed by public health
professionals wishing to find and appraise the best current evidence.
CONCLUSIONS: If public health wishes to continue to claim that it is in the
forefront of evidence-based decision-making, both the skills of the
professionals and the resources available to them need to be improved.
picked from a foully coloured page on Wisdom at
http://www.shef.ac.uk/uni/projects/wrp/clingov.html
>> >I think that evidence-based legal action - patients suing because
>> >practitioners have stuck to tradition/precedent instead of using
>> >interventions of proven effectiveness - could have a lot to
>> >contribute to the progress of ebh.
>> >
>> --
>> Toby Lipman
Only if the expert witnesses on interpreting the evidence are up to scratch.
We already know of course that motives are categorically without question,
but it does appear that the authors of the piece above felt that there was
...scope for improvement...
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