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.
Direct, hyperlinked access to full text high quality systematic reviews, randomised trials and guidelines, organised by area of clinical practice.
Features a meta-register of controlled trials, and a controlled trials links register.
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.
Monash Centre for Clinical Effectiveness
Employees of the Southern Health Care Network in Victoria, Australia, can visit the Monash 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 a subscription.
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.
The 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 Project, CIAP): http://www.ciap.health.nsw.gov.au/
- Queensland (Clinicians Knowledge Network): http://ckn.health.qld.gov.au/
- Victoria (Clinicians Health Channel in Victoria): http://www.clinicians.vic.gov.au
- Western Australia (WA Health Libraries Network): http://www.library.health.wa.gov.au/home/
- South Australia (South Australian Human Services Libraries Consortium, SALUS): http://www.salus.sa.gov.au/
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.
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
Centre for Allied Health Evidence (CAHE)
CAHE 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.
The Oxford Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine
One of the hubs of evidence-based medicine.
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, Steve Simon’s How to read a medical journal article, or the Introduction to information mastery produced by the University of Michigan’s Departmentof Family Practice. The latter is particularly highly recommended. If you don’t want to travel so far, or read very much, try the PEDro tutorials.
Audit, Clinical Governance & Evidence Based Medicine Resources
Contains just what its name says.
OLGA (OnLine Guide to Accessing Health Information)
The University of Tasmania’s Department of Rural Health & Discipline of General Practice maintains a site called OLGA (OnLine Guide to Accessing Health Information). The site contains useful links to assist clinicians and consumers find evidence, as well as tutorials on how to find and appraise evidence.
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
Established by the Commonwealth Government of Australia. This site provides users with a single entry point to quality health information. Information accessed through HealthInsite is sourced from providers of quality 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.
