Many institutions have employed a journal club as the primary initiation to EBP for health care providers. A journal club is most often comprised of a group of persons interested in the same clinical issues. The clinical question to be discussed is of importance to the entire group. Sometimes members are provided evidence to peruse and critically appraise beforehand, or there may be only certain members responsible for finding the evidence and others for interpreting the evidence, so that the responsibilities are shared and rotated throughout the group. There is no set format to which a journal club must adhere. Often the journal club may resemble an inservice or a brown bag educational class. In this session of the symposium, the different variations of a journal club will be discussed. Essential steps to developing a journal club will be provided. Resources for determining the clinical issue to be discussed and finding relevant evidence will be provided. The evidence surrounding benefits and effectiveness of journal clubs will be presented. The need for champions & motivated learners will be emphasized. While implementation of journal clubs without measurement of their effectiveness is common, this approach is contrary to the EBP process. How to measure the effectiveness of a journal club will be a primary focus of this presentation.
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Sigma Theta Tau International
9 July 2003