In this qualitative study, researchers interviewed 31 EBM instructors from multiple US and Canadian medical schools. Several common challenges and potential solutions were identified. Suboptimal role models were the most common challenge mentioned, as students interact with many faculty members having poor EBM skills and understanding. Other challenges mentioned were intrinsic difficulty of the material, students and faculty having difficulty voicing uncertainty, and a lack of clinical context when teaching EBM in the pre-clinical years. Potential solutions were better integration of EBM over many courses during the four years of medical school, EBM training for clinical faculty, and utilizing “whole-task” exercises that start with real or virtual patients rather than EBM exercises in isolation. — Laura Willett, MD
Maggio LA, Ten Cate O, Chen HC, Irby DM, O’Brien BC. “Challenges to Learning Evidence-Based Medicine and Educational Approaches to Meet These Challenges: A Qualitative Study of Selected EBM Curricula in U.S. and Canadian Medical Schools.” Acad Med. 2015 Jul 21.
DR MERL 