Links
This page contains links to related web sites that you may find useful. Try the following:
- Databases of evidence in health care
- Databases of evidence in specific disciplines
- Databases of evidence for specific countries
- Resources for evidence-based practice
- Consumer resources
Databases of evidence in health care
Cochrane systematic reviews provide the best available source of information about the efficacy of health care interventions. Residents of some countries have free access to the full text of the systematic reviews in the Cochrane Library.
Abstracts of Cochrane systematic reviews
Abstracts of Cochrane systematic reviews related to physiotherapy have been reproduced in the PEDro database. For more information about the Cochrane Collaboration visit the Cochrane Collaboration’s homepage in Baltimore, or one of the other Cochrane Centre sites, such as the Australasian Cochrane Centre site.
Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects (DARE)
Another excellent database of quality-reviewed systematic reviews. The DARE site contains brief commentaries on the methodological quality of systematic reviews. Some of the systematic reviews indexed on PEDro have DARE commentaries, links to these are available in the PEDro Detailed Search Results page.
Direct, hyperlinked access to full text high quality systematic reviews, randomised trials and guidelines, organised by area of clinical practice.
TRIPanswers is a collection of clinical questions and answers drawn from sources around the world.
A user friendly, web-based Medline interface. PubMed includes a Clinical Queries facility to assist clinicians find Medline citations on prevention, treatment, prognosis, diagnosis, aetiology and much more.
A brilliant search engine, designed to help users perform optimal searches for a range of clinical questions. SUMSearch is similar to PubMed Clinical Queries, but it searches a much broader literature.
Quebec Rehabilitation Research Network
The Quebec Rehabilitation Research Network provides resources for evidence-based practice for health professionals involved in rehabilitation. One great resource is the REHAB_WATCH newsletter, which is released fortnightly and includes recent interesting publications. Registration is free – just click on the RÉADAP_VEILLE link.
The Joanna Briggs Institute is an international collaboration of nursing, medical and allied health researchers, clinicians and academics. This site provides a range of resources to support evidence-based practice, including Best Practice information sheets. Some areas of the site require subscription.
Centre for Clinical Effectiveness
Employees of the Southern Health Care Network in Victoria, Australia, can visit the Centre for Clinical Effectiveness site. The Centre will conduct searches for evidence relating to specific questions about clinical effectiveness. This service is available free to clinicians at Southern Health, and on a cost recovery basis to others.
Who said there was no such thing as a free lunch? This site links to free medical journals.
Databases of evidence in specific disciplines
Centre for Evidence-Based Physiotherapy, Maastricht
The CEBP Maastricht is a partner of the Centre for Evidence-Based Physiotherapy, Sydney. CEBP Maastricht aims to search, collect and disseminate available scientific evidence in the physiotherapy domain for physiotherapists, health care workers, patients and financiers of health care. It hosts a library of full-text articles scoring 6/10 or more on the PEDro scale.
This is a database of clinical research produced by the American Physical Therapy Association. Hooked on Evidence includes clinical trials, cohort studies, case-control studies, case reports, single-subject experimental designs and cross-sectional studies. Access requires registration, which is free.
OTseeker is a database that contains abstracts of systematic reviews and randomised controlled trials relevant to occupational therapy. Trials have been critically appraised and rated to assist you to evaluate their validity and interpretability. These ratings will help you to judge the quality and usefulness of trials for informing clinical interventions. In one database, OTseeker provides you with fast and easy access to trials from a wide range of sources.
PsycBITE™ is a database that catalogues studies of cognitive, behavioural and other treatments for psychological problems and issues occurring as a consequence of acquired brain impairment (ABI). The types of studies contained on this database are systematic reviews, randomised controlled trials (RCT), non-randomised controlled trials (non-RCT), case series (CS), and single-case experimental designs (SCED).
SpeechBITE is a database that provides open access to a catalogue of Best Interventions and Treatment Efficacy across the scope of speech pathology practice. Studies on this database include systematic reviews, randomised controlled trials, non-randomised controlled trials, case series, and single case experimental designs.
This useful site allows you to search for clinical practice guidelines in all areas of rehabilitation. The quality of the guidelines has been assessed using the AGREE instrument. There are English and French versions of the site.
Research and Training Center (RTC) on Early Childhood Development
This site is dedicated to promoting and enhancing the healthy development of infants, toddlers, and preschoolers, with or at risk for developmental delays or disabilities.
Databases of evidence for specific countries
There are some great information resources available to Health Department employees in Australia. These sites provide single-site access to the full text of the Cochrane Library, OVID access to Medline and Cinahl, clinical guidelines, and much more. The sites are password protected. Health Department employees can obtain passwords from their institutions’ technology support departments. The site addresses by state are:
- New South Wales (Clinical Information Access Portal, CIAP)
- Queensland (Clinicians Knowledge Network)
- Victoria (Clinicians Health Channel in Victoria)
- Western Australia (WA Health Libraries Network)
- South Australia (South Australian Human Services Libraries Consortium, SALUS)
The NSW site, called CIAP, provides access to PEDro through the NSW Health intranet. Just visit the CIAP site and look under “Allied Health Databases” in the index.
The National Institute of Clinical Studies （NICS） is a Commonwealth Government owned company formed to implement evidence-based practice in the Australian healthcare sector. NICS was responsible for negotiating full text access to the Cochrane Library for users of Australian IP addresses.
The Clinical Practice Guidelines Portal indexes clinical practice guidelines developed for use in Australian health care settings.
Health Information Resources provides access to Medline, Cinahl, the Cochrane Library, Clinical Evidence, and some databases of guidelines to National Health Service (United Kingdom) employees.
Resources for evidence-based practice
CONSORT is the acronym for the “Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials”. The CONSORT Statement is an evidence-based, minimum set of recommendations for the reporting of randomised controlled trials.
PRISMA is the acronym for the “Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses”. The PRISMA Statement is an evidence-based minimum set of items for reporting in systematic reviews. The PRISMA Statement is an update and expansion of the now-out dated QUOROM Statement.
Registration of clinical trials and systematic reviews
Registration of clinical trials and systematic reviews avoids duplication of effort and prevents selective reporting and publication bias. Additionally, clinical trial registration may assist in the recruitment of participants and make identification of trials for systematic reviews easier. Pinto et al (2013) demonstrated that registration of randomised controlled trials of physiotherapy interventions is very low and rarely prospective. To address this, the International Society of Physiotherapy Journal Editors (ISPJE) recommends that member journals implement a policy for the prospective registration of trials, as described in an editorial published in several ISPJE-member journals. Clinical trials can be registered in free, publicly available, and electronically searchable registers such as clinicaltrials.gov and the Australian New Zealand Clinical Trial Registry. Information on clinical trials from different registers can be found at the WHO registry search portal. Registration of systematic reviews is also free and open to anyone; available registers include the Cochrane Library and Prospero.
The Centre for Evidence-Based Physiotherapy endorse the All Trials Registered – All Results Reported petition. To add your support for the petition follow the link below.
International Centre for Allied Health Evidence (iCAHE)
iCAHE provides essential resources for allied health workers, researchers, educators, clinicians, policy makers, administrators and patients, by providing a repository for evidence-based research in a range of areas from physiotherapy through to medical radiations. The Centre provides a unique opportunity to produce evidence-based solutions to allied health problems and ensure that treatment strategies are based on the best evidence and research available.
Some very useful tools produced by those very clever Canadians.
A calculator that generates NNTs from other measures of the size of a treatment effect (relative risks, odds ratios or abslolute risk reductions) and a clever way of visualising what the NNTs really mean.
Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine
One of the hubs of evidence-based medicine. This site includes an updated version of the levels of evidence table.
Critical appraisal
If you want more advice on how to read clinical trials (or other forms of clinical evidence) you could consult the classic (still un-rivalled) CMAJ/JAMA User’s Guides or Steve Simon’s How to read a medical journal article. If you don’t want to travel so far, or read very much, try the PEDro tutorials.
Finding and Appraising the Evidence
Six on-line modules written by Amanda Burls and Anne Brice for HealthKnowledge. The modules focus on how to find the evidence and then how to assess the validity and reliability of the published research in order to provide effective and efficient healthcare.
European Union Evidence Based Medicine Unity Project
The EU-EBM Unity Project provides on-line training in the five basic steps of evidence-based practice plus train-the-trainer curriculum in English, German, Italian, Polish, and French.
Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation (AGREE)
The Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation (AGREE) Instrument evaluates the process of practice guideline development and the quality of reporting. The original AGREE Instrument has been updated. This site contains information and resources about the new AGREE II Instrument.
Audit, Clinical Governance & Evidence Based Medicine Resources
Contains just what its name says.
An extensive catalogue of evidence in health care web sites.
World Confederation for Physical Therapy (WCPT)
The WCPT actively promotes evidence-based physiotherapy.
Consumer resources
Healthinsite was established by the Australian Government and is a gateway to quality health information for consumers. It provides links to over 17,000 resources on the websites of over 80 of Australia’s trusted information organisations (including PEDro). It aims to improve the health of Australians by providing easy access to reliable health information.
Healthfinder® is a database of government and nonprofit health and human services information on the internet.
Formerly the Cochrane Consumer Network website, Informed Health Online is a database of Cochrane reviews summarised for consumers.
Physiotherapy Choices is the consumer interface for the Physiotherapy Evidence Database （PEDro）.
We welcome suggestions for new, high quality links. To make a suggestion please contact us.
