Psy.D. Program

What kind of article, review, or study is it?

Systematic Reviews -- a comprehensive literature review; an overview of all the quality research dealing with a specific clinical research topic.

Randomized Controlled Trials -- clinical trials in which participants are randomly assigned to the test treatment and control treatment groups.  This is the "gold standard" research method for Evidence Based Practice.

Cohort Studies -- longitudinal studies that analyze the risk factors of a defined population being diagnosed with a certain disease.

Case Control Studies -- studies that compare a group of patients with a disease to a control group without the disease in order to gain a complete history of the disease, its diagnosis and etiology.

Case Series, Case Reports -- presentations of clinical reports based on patient treatment

Editorials, Expert Opinions -- informative data written by someone with special knowledge of subject.  ie. commentary, editorial, viewpoint essay.

PICO

The first step in research or evidence-based practice is defining a problem and asking a question. In the research process, this becomes part of developing a proposal for a study. In the clinical setting, ‘asking a question’ may become part of a research study, a quality improvement project, or lead to evidence-based practice.

A commonly used format for creating a clinical question is known as PICO which refers to:

P — Patient population of interest 

I — Intervention/issue of interest 

C — Comparison of interest 

O — Outcome of interest

-- ANA: American Nurses Association | Research Toolkit | "Asking the Question"

PICOTT

While searching for evidence-based research, each article must be evaluated to determine whether or not it is relevant to your research question.  Answering the PICO or PICOTT questions while reading the article can help you to use the information effectively.
To evaluate whether an article is relevant to your research, use PICO/TT:

P - PATIENT OR PROBLEM -- How would you describe a group of patients similar to yours? What are the most important characteristics of the patient?

I - INTERVENTION, EXPOSURE, PROGNOSTIC FACTOR -- What main intervention are you considering? What do you want to do with this patient?

C - COMPARISON -- What is the main alternative being considered?

O - OUTCOME -- What are you trying to accomplish, measure, improve, or affect?

To further determine relevance, add:

T - Type of Question -- Therapy / Diagnosis / Harm / Prognosis / Prevention

T - Type of Study -- Is this a Systematic review / Randomized Controlled Trial / Cohort Study / Case Control Study?

Hint: Most PICO/PICOTT information can be found in the abstract.

Is This Article Valid?

Anyone can publish anything on the Internet. For that reason, it is important to critically evaluate all information found on the Internet.  One must also review articles in magazines and journals with a critical eye, concerning oneself with the author(s) main idea, accuracy of facts, timeliness and biases.

Here are some questions to ask yourself while reviewing a website or article? 

Accuracy 

• What is the purpose of the site?
• Who created the site?
• Are the facts accurate?

Authority

• What are the credentials of the author(s)/organization who produced the site?
• Is contact information for the author(s)/organization provided?
• What is the domain of the website?

Currency 

• When was the site created?
• When was it last updated, and is this done regularly?
• How current are the links? Do they work?

Coverage

• Are the links evaluated?
• Is the information cited accurately?
• Is there balance with text and images? 

Objectivity

• What are the goals & objectives of the website?
• Are they trying to sell you something?
• Is there a bias?