Key facts

Overview

This module will introduce the basic concepts and skills of Evidence-Based Health Care. Teaching will be led by Dr Amanda Burls who is director of Postgraduate Programmes in Evidence-Based Health Care and a Senior Fellow of the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine, at the University of Oxford.

Description

By the end of the module students will be able to:

• formulate and define a research question clearly and cogently
• understand which types of study design (trials, observational, qualitative etc.) are most appropriate for which types of clinical questions
• identify which study type has been used, and judge how this affects the interpretation of the results
• establish criteria for accepting and rejecting good and bad evidence
• appraise a research paper to:
  • identify whether the hypothesis of a paper is concerned with the efficacy of intervention, causality, test accuracy or determining the magnitude of the health problem
  • identify which study type has been used, and judge how this affects the interpretation of the results
• calculate and interpret measures of disease frequency and measures of association
• identify and assess the implications of the main forms of bias (selection, measurement, confounding, lead time, and length bias) in epidemiological and clinical medicine research
• appraise basic study types: diagnostic accuracy studies, prognostic cohort studies, treatment trials, prevalence surveys
• appraise the methods of a systematic review, and understand their importance and limitations
• know which are the best sources for finding reliable research evidence and other information
• undertake both (i) comprehensive and sensitive and (ii) rapid and specific literature searches for specific topics or questions
• summarise the methods, key findings, and quantitative results of valid studies
• calculate quantitative measures such as relative risk, relative risk reduction, absolute risk, and Number Needed to Treat
• interpret measures of statistical uncertainty such as p-values and confidence intervals
• provide an analysis of the implications of acceptable studies for clinical or public health practice.

Staff

Dr Amanda Burls

Role: Tutor

Amanda Burls is Director of Postgraduate Programmes in Evidence-Based Health Care, and a Senior Fellow of the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine,...more at the University of Oxford. In her role as a Senior Clinical Research Fellow in the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at the University she is focusing on setting up and directing a novel internet-based project, ThinkWell, that aims to help the public understand health information to make their own health decisions and put them at the heart of the health research agenda.

In her previous post she was a Senior Clinical Lecturer in Public Health and Epidemiology in the Department of Public Health and Epidemiology, University of Birmingham and an Honorary Consultant in Public Health Medicine in the West Midlands Region. While at the University of Birmingham she founded the West Midlands Health Technology Assessment Collaboration (WMHTAC) and was its Director for ten years. WMHTAC is an NHS-funded unit that undertakes systematic reviews, research synthesis and economic evaluations of health technologies for the West Midlands regional and the UK national level NHS (e.g. for the NCCHTA programme and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE)). Prior to taking up her post in Birmingham she was Director of the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) in Oxford and was one of the founders of the CASP International Network.

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Dr Juan Cabello

Role: Speaker

Dr Sharon Mickan

Role: Speaker

Assessment methods

Accommodation

Accommodation is available at the Rewley House Residential Centre, within the Department for Continuing Education, in central Oxford. The comfortable, en-suite, study-bedrooms are rated 3-star, and come with free high-speed internet access and TV. Guests can take advantage of the excellent dining facilities and common room bar, where they may relax and network with others on the programme.

Scholarships

Details of funding opportunities, including grants, bursaries, loans, scholarships and benefit information are available on our financial assistance page.

Fee options

Programme Fee

For students enrolled on the MSc in Evidence-Based Health Care: £1450.00

Stand-alone short course fee: £1790.00

Apply for this course

Programmes including this module

This module can be studied as part of these programmes:

• MSc in Evidence-Based Health Care
• Postgraduate Certificate in Health Research
• Short courses in health sciences