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Evidence-Based Medicine: Learning Modules

Introduction

These modules are meant to support learning in the UMass Chan 3rd year clerkship program.  Seminars in using and applying Best-Evidence will be offered in the Family Medicine portion of the "Care of the Family" Clerkship.  Review of these modules is required for all students prior to in-class sessions as initial understanding of this information.  Students will be asked to utilize, comment upon and give informal presentations based upon this content.

EBM Videos

This collection of videos covers many topics and themes of Evidence Based Medicine:

EBM Explained - What is EBM, problems with EBM (paralysis, best available, latest research can alter view/look at systematic reviews, Evidence means different things)

The Epidemic of the 'Know It All' Expert - Why saying 'I don't know' and asking good questions makes you a better health professional, and is better for patient care

EBM and the Literature

Creating a PICO Question

Pubmed Literature Searching - Basic search strategy, boolean operators, tags, filters

Study Types - Overview of most common types of research studies and their strengths and weaknesses

Systematic Reviews and Meta-analyses - a brief introduction to these study types and how to evaluate them

NNT/NNH - Tutorial covering number needed to treat and number needed to harm calculations

Overdiagnosis

Bias - How bias effects published results - for overview of specific types of bias, see learning module below

Medical Statistics

Bayes Theorem - Medical testing probability

Confidence Intervals - understanding confidence intervals and statistical uncertainty

Sensitivity and Specificity

Positive/Negative Predictive Value

TED Talks

Own Your Body's Data - First 5 minutes cover a real life use of medical decision making in the face of relative and absolute risk (the remainder is less relevant to EBM, but very instructional about pregnancy planning)

EBM Modules

The following videos will cover topics that will be discussed in your EBM session. You should watch the short tutorials on EBM &PICO, Tips for Searching, Review of Study Designs, Patient Oriented vs. Disease Oriented Outcomes, Systematic Reviews and Meta Analysis, Absolute and Relative Risk, and Bias in the Medical Literature.

 

Lurking Variables

"Lies, Damed Lies and Statistics" - att. Benjamin Disraeli - or how Simpson's Paradox can make make statistic misleading.

EBM-Oriented Song Parody

If you want a more lite-hearted take on EBM, check out these YouTube song parodies by Dr. James McCormack from British Columbia, Canada.

Another EBM-Oriented Song Parody

One more EBM-Oriented Song Parody