Free: Evidence-Based Website for Allied Health Professionals (MD, RNs, PTs, OTs, etc.)

Source

With the recent news of CDC being forbidden to use phrases such as "evidence-based", this seems counter-intuitive to me as a future therapist graduate.

We have been ingrained into our heads as students the need for evidence-based practice (EBP) with quality research.

So there is definitely a need, with goals such as the Triple aim and Healthy people 2020.
Some foreseeable barriers as a future occupational therapy practitioner that I can see to EBP include:

• Cost / Access: Often times, research is behind a pay-wall and only accessible on obscure journals. Of course there are free alternatives including Cochrane, Systematic reviews, Google Scholar, and the EBP sections of your disciplines website, e.g. Critically Appraised Papers (CAP) from the American Occupational Therapy Association.

However, this can be overwhelming and can lead to the 2nd barrier...

• Time: Being a working professional, having a personal life, etc. - Reading research takes its own time and also...

• Knowledge: A level of expertise to decipher this information and come to conclusion. Who still remembers how to determine the significance of a p-value, etc. =)

My Solution

I recently came across a free resource by the US Dept. of Health and Human Services called National Guideline Clearinghouse.

"AHRQ's National Guideline Clearinghouse is a public resource for summaries of evidence-based clinical practice guidelines."

They basically have a summary of the recent and significant EBP highlighted by significance/level of research in an easy to understand bullet point form for any healthcare discipline you can think of and it's all free.

I usually filter by Clinical Specialty and then add a second filter for [Intended Users] e.g. Nurses

National Guideline Clearinghouse (NGC). Guideline summary: Fall prevention. In: Evidence-based geriatric nursing protocols for best practice. In: National Guideline Clearinghouse (NGC) [Web site]. Rockville (MD): Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ); 2012 Jan 01. [cited 2017 Dec 18]. Available: https://www.guideline.gov

It's easy to CITE it too!
Super easy to read, takes little time, and is clinically significant!

Check it out here: https://www.guideline.gov
Happy researching!