TY - JOUR T1 - [How effective is the teaching of critical analysis of scientific publications? Review of studies and their methodological quality] JF - Canadian Medical Association Journal JO - CMAJ SP - 945 LP - 952 VL - 148 IS - 6 AU - N. Audet AU - R. Gagnon AU - R. Ladouceur AU - M. Marcil Y1 - 1993/03/15 UR - http://www.cmaj.ca/content/148/6/945.abstract N2 - OBJECTIVE: To evaluate studies assessing the effectiveness of teaching critical appraisal of the literature to medical students. DATA SOURCES: French and English articles published between 1980 and 1990 indexed on MEDLINE or FAMLI as well as articles identified from the bibliographies. STUDY SELECTION: Studies were evaluated if the subjects were undergraduate or postgraduate medical students and if the teaching intervention was aimed at improving one or more of the following areas: knowledge in clinical epidemiology and biostatistics, reading habits and ability to critically appraise a scientific article. DATA EXTRACTION: The methodologic quality of the articles was assessed by three evaluators, who used a modified version of Poynard's checklist to assign a score. Articles with a score of 60% or more were considered satisfactory. The reliability of the checklist was evaluated by means of the kappa (kappa) coefficient and a coefficient of intraclass correlation. DATA SYNTHESIS: For the three evaluators the mean kappa coefficient was 0.33 and the coefficient of intraclass correlation 0.70. Five of the 10 studies had an overall score of 60% or higher. The quality of the individual sections of the articles varied: purpose of the study 85%, description of the population 58%, methods 44%, analysis of results 50%, and conclusions 90%. CONCLUSIONS: The effectiveness of teaching critical appraisal of the literature remains uncertain. More rigorous methods are needed in research in this area. ER -