Operative dentistry aje qualtrough, jd satterthwaite la morrow, pa brunton

IMPLEMENTATION OF RESEARCH EVIDENCE AND EVALUATION
OF ITS APPLICATION
Not all valid research articles will be relevant to your clinical practice.
Even if a study focuses on a particular intervention or outcome of
interest, consideration needs to be given to the external validity of the
piece of research. Are the participants included in the research article
similar enough to the patients you deal with, or are they so different
that the results don’t apply? Even if you feel the study is relevant to
your clinical practice, implementing the findings is not always easy.
There are many barriers that may prevent the integration of research
findings into your everyday practice. Time, financial resources and
the organisation of the practice in which you work may all prevent 
the adoption of research evidence
9
. Similarly, opinion leaders within
the practice, current beliefs and attitudes regarding treatment options
and, increasingly, patients’ perceptions about what they consider to
be appropriate care all can play their part in preventing best evidence
from changing clinical practice.
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Evidence based practice


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A variety of implementation strategies have been used to try and
improve the uptake of research findings, including educational 
outreach visits, manual or computerised reminders, interactive 
educational sessions and audit and feedback. The effectiveness of an 
implementation strategy appears to be dependent upon individual
circumstances, with multifaceted interventions targeting barriers to
change being more likely to be effective than a single intervention
5
.
There appears to be no single implementation model that can be
applied across all settings. Before attempting to change clinical prac-
tice, local barriers need to be identified and strategies to overcome
them explored.