Abstract

The strength of the evidence to answer any clinical question depends on the quantity and quality of the evidence and the consistency of findings across studies. The nature of the clinical question determines what study designs provide the strongest evidence. Randomized clinical trials provide the strongest evidence for therapy and harm questions, while various descriptive study designs provide strongest evidence for prognosis, diagnosis and human response / meaning questions. A systematic review of individual studies is a particularly efficient way for practitioners to determine the quantity of evidence as well as the consistency of findings. For evidence-based practice guidelines, explicit scales rate the strength of evidence underlying recommendations.

Notes

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Authors

Jeanne T. Grace

Author Details

Jeanne T. Grace, RN, PhD

Sigma Membership

Epsilon Xi

Type

Article

Format Type

Text-based Document

Study Design/Type

N/A

Research Approach

N/A

Keywords:

Evidence-based Practice (EBP), Strength of Evidence, Clinical Questions

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Publisher

Mahidol University, Thailand

Version

Publisher's Version

Rights Holder

All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.

All permission requests should be directed accordingly and not to the Sigma Repository.

All submitting authors or publishers have affirmed that when using material in their work where they do not own copyright, they have obtained permission of the copyright holder prior to submission and the rights holder has been acknowledged as necessary.

Review Type

External Review: Previously Published Material

Acquisition

Proxy-submission

Date of Issue

2009-05-01

Full Text of Presentation

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