Evidence-Based Practice Across the Health Professions

by Tammy Hoffmann, Sally Bennett, Chris Del Mar

Evidence-based based practice continues to be a growing influence in health education. It's a powerful tool which can lead to more effective practice, promote communication and interdisciplinary healthcare, and improve the clinician's knowledge and clinical reasoning skills. It's the integration of clinical expertise and practice, with the best available research and evidence for the improvement of patient outcomes. The volume, diversity and quality of research that exists is staggering - thousands of new medical articles are published every day - how do students and practitioners find the right kind of evidence to make well informed decisions, integrate that evidence into practice and finally, communicate it to their patients and colleagues? Evidence-based practice across the health professions is an important text that ties all of these concepts together in a way that is relevant to all health profession students and clinicians engaged in client care.

Multi-disciplinary approach - case studies from a cross section of professions are discussed so that health professionals from a range of disciplines will benefit from familiarity with the intervention being evaluated, the context of the intervention and the outcome measures used

Suitable for all levels of education - from undergraduate to postgraduate and practicing clinicians

Provides a range of practical strategies on implementing evidence into practice

Provides detailed, worked examples of appraised papers - both discipline specific and multi-disciplinary)

Summary points and learning activities at the end of each chapter

Supported by an Evolve resource that provides additional revision questions that utilize a range of question formats.

This book will provide the reader with the basic knowledge and skills necessary to be an evidence-based clinician and to understand the implications of evidence-based practice (EBP) in the overall healthcare environment. The book will contain two parts. Part 1 provides the EBP content that is generic to most health professions. The Part 2 provides information about the EBP-related issues that are specific to each health profession and to multidisciplinary teams. Part 1 will cover all of the key steps in the EBP process, such as formulating clinical questions, knowing what type of evidence is appropriate for various clinical questions, finding evidence effectively, appraising the various types of evidence, and making sense of the results sections of papers. It will also include a chapter on research translation and implementing EBP and other topics not typically addressed in other texts, such as how to communicate evidence to clients and other stakeholders, and the importance of clinical reasoning in EBP.

364 pages, Paperback

First published October 16, 2009

Reviews

[Wren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have completed 3 grad classes on methods in the humanities, but I'm getting a master's in gerontology, a program housed with allied health care, so I had to change gears. This textbook is very good, and any disconnect was due to my being wired to think like a student of humanities. The book is incredibly detailed on an array of research methods in the sciences. I learned a lot, and I will be able to assess research articles with more confidence. I don't have to conduct original research, but this textbook is thorough enough to help those grad students who will have to design, conduct and write up research in the health professions.