Asking a clinical question involves creating a PICO or PICOTT question
P patient, population and/or problem
I intervention, prognostic factor, exposure
C comparison, or comparative intervention (if appropriate)- this could also be the absence of intervention or exposure
O outcome you would like to measure or achieve
T type of question you are asking
T type of study you would want to find
Type of Question |
Study Design for Question* |
Example |
Therapy |
RCT (randomized controlled trial) |
Is this intervention more effective than another? |
Diagnostic test |
Independent, prospective blind comparison to a gold standard |
How accurate is this diagnostic test? |
Prognosis |
Cohort study à case-control à case series |
What is the likely outcome, progression, or survival time for this condition? |
Harm/Etiology |
**RCT à cohort study à case-control à case series |
What are the possible causes of this condition or state of affairs? |
Prevention |
RCT à cohort study à case-control |
How to reduce the risk of this disease? |
Using Clinical Queries, you can specify the type of question to narrow the study design results. These can be found in both CINAHL in the filters and PubMed Clinical Queries.
This database provides a detailed index and full text of scholarly articles in nursing and allied health literature, including biomedicine and consumer health, scholarly journals, evidence-based practice guidelines, and other publications. Additional materials include full-text evidence-based care sheets, quick lessons, health care books, nursing dissertations, selected conference proceedings, and continuing education modules.
Users they may not use the Databases and Services in combination with an artificial intelligence tool (including to train an algorithm, test, process, analyze, generate output and/or develop any form of artificial intelligence tool). Notwithstanding anything to the contrary, Licensee and Authorized Users may use, transmit, view, or store the content or outputs from the Database, Services, or e-content in any software tools and/or systems that may have artificial intelligence tools running therein
What is EBM?
Evidence-based medicine (EBM) is the integration of best research evidence with clinical expertise and patient values.
When these three elements are integrated, clinicians and patients form a diagnostic and therapeutic alliance which optimizes clinical outcomes and quality of life.
From: The Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine (CEBM)
Adapted with permission from https://libguides.ohsu.edu/ebptoolkit/whatisebp, https://guides.library.stonybrook.edu/evidence-based-medicine/home.