Evidence based medicine (EBM) should form the foundation of effective clinical decision making; however, growing unrest—and an awful lot of criticism—suggests the evidence bit of EBM is increasingly part of the problem, and not the solution.
Concerns with quality and rigour in research are leading to a lack of trust in the production, publication, and utilisation of evidence. Des Spence, writing in The BMJ, thinks the situation is so bad that, “Evidence based medicine is broken,” and when an official from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) also reports, “The clinical trial system is broken and it’s getting worse,” you have to acknowledge that there might be problems with the evidence base.
And here are a sample of 250 plus retweets from the original BMJ post on the article:
Neat point “@AllenFrancesMD: Evidence Based Medicine mess needs reform-but can’t be replaced http://t.co/iPOEOdtDFC @LifestyleElf
— carl heneghan (@cebmblog) December 6, 2014
Absolutely! @BrianAlperMD In my experience, professionals who use evidence often lack those essential critical appraisal skills @cebmblog
— The Mental Elf (@Mental_Elf) December 6, 2014
@Mental_Elf @cebmblog If critical appraisal skipped (too hard, too much) then EBM problem; evidence w/o critical analysis should be on trial
— Brian S. Alper, MD (@BrianAlperMD) December 6, 2014
"medicine is potentially harming the healthy…" RT @cebmblog: Evidence based medicine on trial – http://t.co/9AqhatXhRR
— Bob Merberg (@bmerberg) December 5, 2014
"Clinicians require skills to interpret & evaluate the evidence." from @cebmblog's 'Evidence based medicine on trial' http://t.co/zrFzDtvZ6j
— CADTH (@CADTH_ACMTS) December 5, 2014
Compelling post by @cebmblog. We must get EBM right. Lay public's mistrust of science is clear and present danger. http://t.co/FK7ZI5mQjR
— Greg Bryson (@glbryson) December 5, 2014