Evidence-Based Medicine

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Evidence-Based Medicine

The process of systematically finding, appraising, and using contemporaneous research findings as the basis for clinical decisions. Evidence-based medicine asks questions, finds and appraises the relevant data, and harnesses that information for everyday clinical practice. Evidence-based medicine follows four steps: formulate a clear clinical question from a patient's problem; search the literature for relevant clinical articles; evaluate (critically appraise) the evidence for its validity and usefulness; implement useful findings in clinical practice. The term "evidence based medicine" (no hyphen) was coined at McMaster Medical School in Canada in the 1980's to label this clinical learning strategy, which people at the school had been developing for over a decade. (From BMJ 1995;310:1122)