Bmc Health Serv Res
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Bmc Health Serv Res · Jan 2002
What kind of evidence is it that Evidence-Based Medicine advocates want health care providers and consumers to pay attention to?
In 1992, Evidence-Based Medicine advocates proclaimed a "new paradigm", in which evidence from health care research is the best basis for decisions for individual patients and health systems. Hailed in New York Times Magazine in 2001 as one of the most influential ideas of the year, this approach was initially and provocatively pitted against the traditional teaching of medicine, in which the key elements of knowing for clinical purposes are understanding of basic pathophysiologic mechanisms of disease coupled with clinical experience. This paper reviews the origins, aspirations, philosophical limitations, and practical challenges of evidence-based medicine. ⋯ Advocates of evidence-based medicine want clinicians and consumers to pay attention to the best findings from health care research that are both valid and ready for clinical application. Much remains to be done to reach this goal.
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Bmc Health Serv Res · Jan 2002
Reporting of measures of accuracy in systematic reviews of diagnostic literature.
There are a variety of ways in which accuracy of clinical tests can be summarised in systematic reviews. Variation in reporting of summary measures has only been assessed in a small survey restricted to meta-analyses of screening studies found in a single database. Therefore, we performed this study to assess the measures of accuracy used for reporting results of primary studies as well as their meta-analysis in systematic reviews of test accuracy studies. ⋯ There is considerable variation in ways of reporting and summarising results of test accuracy studies in systematic reviews. There is a need for consensus about the best ways of reporting results of test accuracy studies in reviews.