are health sciences librarians taking the ebm challenge?
DESCRIPTION
Paper presented at the Canadian Association for Information Science (CAIS) Annual Conference, Vancouver, BC, June 5–7, 2008. The paper was also published in the conference proceedingsTRANSCRIPT
Are Health Sciences Librarians Taking the Evidence-Based Medicine Challenge?
Ping Li, PhD GSLIS, Queens College, City University of New York
Lin Wu, MLIS, AHIP Health Sciences Library and Biocommunications Center
University of Tennessee Health Science Center
Canadian Association for Information Science (CAIS) Annual Conference, Vancouver, BC, June 5–7, 2008
Introduction
Evidence-Based Medicine (EBM)
What is EBM?
“The integration of best research evidence with clinical expertise and patient values” (Sackett et al. 2000).
Key Components of EBM
Formulating focused and answerable clinical questions
Finding the best evidence Critically appraising the evidence Applying results in clinical practice Evaluating performance (Babish 2003)
Challenges
Health care professionals
Health sciences librarians
Why Researching?
Reference job content analysisReference job content analysis DisconnectsDisconnects
? ?
Research Objective
To investigate whether and how health sciences librarians have been taking the evidence-based medicine (EBM) challenge.
Methodology
Content analysis
Job postings from January 2000 through December 2007
Literature review
Librarians' EBM-related duties, responsibilities, and activities
Results – Content Analysis
Total job ads: 726
Total reference jobs: 336 (46%)
Total job ads related to EBM: 54 (16%)
EBM Job Postings by Library Type
Library Type Number Percentage
Academic 39 72%
Special 12 22%
Hospital 3 6%
Total 54 100%
EBM Job Postings by Year
Year Number Percentage
2000 6 11%
2001 8 15%
2002 3 6%
2003 5 9%
2004 8 15%
2005 11 20%
2006 7 13%
2007 6 11%
Total 54 100%
Results- 6 EBM Related Variables
EBM01: Expertise with/knowledge of EBM resources
EBM02: Providing evidence-based medical research
EBM03: Contributing to evidence-based initiatives
EBM04: Attending morning reports, medical rounds, or journal club
EBM05: Teaching EBM
EBM06: Supporting evidence-based practice (EBP)
Positions (%) Requesting EBM-Related Qualifications and Duties
52%
17%
6%4%
32%
22%
EBM01
EBM02
EBM03
EBM04
EBM05
EBM06
Results – Literature Review
Sources of Literature
PubMed/Medline CINAHL LISTA Academic Search Premier
Results – Literature Review (Cont’d)
41 Articles Identified Opinion articles Articles reporting on librarians’ EBM-related activities
Most are of project nature Only 4 articles reported on librarians’ routine involvement in EBM-related activities
Results – Literature Review (Cont’d)
Librarians’ Project-Related EBM Roles:
Team members Partners Played a leading role in 3 projects
Results – Literature Review (Cont’d)
Librarians’ Routine EBM-Related Activities Participating in the curriculum integration to support EBM Participating in morning reports to improve residents’ information searching skills Identifying, supplying, and providing training in EBP resources for educational programs Participating in graduate medical education, finding and relating the best evidence to clinical problems
Discussion
Health sciences librarians Library administrators EBM practice in health care settings
Conclusions
Potential existence of disconnects
Significances
Guidance for both employers and employees Insight into the training of future librarians
What to Be Done Next?
More rigid data to validate the findings A survey to investigate health sciences
librarians’ actual involvements related to EBM
Reference
Sackett, David L., Sharon E. Straus, W. Scott Richardson,
William Rosenberg, and R. Brian Haynes. 2000.
Evidence based medicine: how to practice and
teach EBM. 2nd ed. Edinburgh: Churchill Livingstone.
Babish, JoAnn. 2003. Evidence-based medicine morning
report: overview and role of the librarian. Journal of Hospital
Librarianship 3, no. 4: 35-45.
Thank you!
Full paper is available athttp://www.cais-acsi.ca/2008proceedings.htm
Ping Li: [email protected]
Lin Wu: [email protected]