Research Hacked: Health & Medical Topics
Clarify Health Information Seeking Needs
What kinds of health or medical information might someone need?
Consumer:
Medical condition/illness, nutrition, alternative medicine/experimental treatment, prescription/drug, exercise (Clarke et al., 2016)
College students:
Concern for a particular health condition or disease, a health-related risk or benefit, or an interest in a discovery covered by the media (Basch et al., 2018)
Clinicians:
Therapy, diagnosis, and epidemiology (Daei et al., 2020)
References
Basch, C. H., MacLean, S. A., Romero, R.-A., & Ethan, D. (2018). Health Information Seeking Behavior Among College Students. Journal of Community Health, 43(6), 1094–1099. https://discovery.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=f56e1030-d181-3108-a7a8-2608a576b63f
Clarke, M. A., Moore, J. L., Steege, L. M., Koopman, R. J., Belden, J. L., Canfield, S. M., Meadows, S. E., Elliott, S. G., & Kim, M. S. (2016). Health information needs, sources, and barriers of primary care patients to achieve patient-centered care: A literature review. Health Informatics Journal, 22(4), 992–1016. https://doi.org/10.1177/1460458215602939
Daei, A., Soleymani, M. R., Ashrafi-Rizi, H., Zargham-Boroujeni, A., & Kelishadi, R. (2020). Clinical information seeking behavior of physicians: A systematic review. International Journal of Medical Informatics, 139, 104144. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijmedinf.2020.104144
Understand Evidence-Based Medicine
What is evidence-based medicine?
“Evidence based medicine is the conscientious, explicit, and judicious use of current best evidence in making decisions about the care of individual patients" (Sackett et al., 1996, p. 71). Also called evidence-based practice, EBM incorporates the practitioner's expertise and clinical judgement with relevant scientific evidence to honor patients' values and preferences in recommending treatment.
Reference
Sackett, D. L., Rosenberg, W. M., Gray, J. A., Haynes, R. B., & Richardson, W. S. (1996). Evidence based medicine: what it is and what it isn't. BMJ (Clinical research ed.), 312(7023), 71–72. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.312.7023.71, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2349778/
Dive Deeper
Johns Hopkins Evidence-Based Practice for Nurses and Healthcare Professionals, Fourth Edition by Call Number: eBookISBN: 9781948057875Publication Date: 2021-07-15The goal of EBP in healthcare is to promote improved interventions, care, and patient outcomes. This is a foundational book on EBP in nursing and healthcare.
Climb Dartmouth's Evidence Pyramid
Dartmouth's Evidence Pyramid provides a way to visualize both the quality of evidence and the amount of evidence available. For example, systematic reviews are at the top of the pyramid, meaning they are both the highest level of evidence and the least common. As you go down the pyramid, the amount of evidence will increase as the quality of the evidence decreases. Image credit: EBM Pyramid by Trustees of Dartmouth College and Yale University.
Here's another take on the evidence pyramid indicating primary vs. secondary sources and explaining each level.
Take the Tutorial
- Evaluating Internet Health Information: A Tutorial From the National Library of Medicine
This tutorial teaches you how to evaluate the health information you find on the Internet.