HS858-7-AS-CO:
Using Evidence in Health Care Practice
2024/25
Health and Social Care (School of)
Colchester Campus
Autumn & Summer
Postgraduate: Level 7
Current
Monday 07 October 2024
Friday 28 March 2025
15
19 March 2024
Requisites for this module
(none)
(none)
(none)
(none)
HS754, HS755, HS859
MSC B93024 Occupational Therapy (Pre-Registration),
MSC B62024 Speech and Language Therapy (Pre-Registration)
There is an appreciation you each bring to this module a diverse range of knowledge and experience of both evidence-based practice and use of on line media. The purpose of this module is to support development of a critical response to evidence to support your growth as a professional healthcare worker. Evidence-based practice underpins every single module you study and every day you spend on placement and every patient contact. This module therefore supports all other activities on your programme, and is not a separate and discrete topic.
The aims of this module are:
- To help you to develop rigorous critical appraisal skills to support evidence-based practice in health care. Critical appraisal is the process of carefully and systematically examining research to judge its trustworthiness and its value and relevance in a particular context.
- To encourage a rich understanding of the value of different types of evidence in order to apply evidence in practice settings. Integral to this are the skills necessary to produce and appraise a body of literature to take forward into the planning for whichever dissertation option is chosen.
- To set you up to be able to organise and interpret a body of evidence in preparation for ongoing research activity.
- To support you to a level where you can apply evidence to professional practice and justify the choices you make about the type of dissertation path you choose to follow.
- To enable you to explore the wide range of online learning methods and resources so that you can embed evidence-based practice into your professional development.
By the end of this module, students will be expected to be able to:
- Critically evaluate the appropriateness of different research approaches and their importance to using and developing evidence-based practice.
- Utilise appropriate research tools, strategies and frameworks to define and refine practice-based questions, to systematically search for and retrieve relevant peer reviewed articles and grey literature.
- Critique, adapt and apply a range of research methods, governance strategies and ethical practices to the appraisal of quality and content of research output, papers and reports within your own professional discipline.
- Present work in a professional manner, competently expressed and edited and using language appropriate to the professional discipline and required ethical standards. Use appropriate citation and referencing protocols ensuring that evidence presented is proportionate to claims made.
- Identify a specific topic and evaluate the evidence base in relation to this selected topic; justify for future research in a proposed area.
This is an interprofessional module involving two disciplines:
Occupational Therapy
Speech & Language Therapy
The module will be delivered via:
- In-person and online learning utilising a variety of teaching and learning methods to suit a range of student knowledge and competencies in both research and online learning. The initial activities will be highly structured thus supporting confidence and competence in using different teaching and learning media, with increasing opportunities for you to manage, contribute and structure your engagement with the materials as the module progresses.
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Aveyard, H. (2023)
Doing a literature review in health and social care: a practical guide. Fifth edition. London: Open University Press. Available at:
https://app.kortext.com/Shibboleth.sso/Login?entityID=https://idp0.essex.ac.uk/shibboleth&target=https://app.kortext.com/borrow/2344343.
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Garrard, J. (2022)
Health sciences literature review made easy: the matrix method. 6th ed. Burlington, Los Angeles: Jones & Bartlett Learning, LLC. Available at:
https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&scope=site&db=nlebk&db=nlabk&AN=2693815.
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Trisha, G., Sally, T. and Kirsti, M. (no date) ‘Time to challenge the spurious hierarchy of systematic over narrative reviews?’,
European Journal of Clinical Investigation, 48(6). Available at:
https://doi-org.uniessexlib.idm.oclc.org/10.1111/eci.12931.
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Aveyard, H. and Sharp, P. (2017)
A beginner’s guide to evidence-based practice in health and social care. Third edition. London: Open University Press, McGraw-Hill Education. Available at:
https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/universityofessex-ebooks/detail.action?docID=6212202.
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David L. Sackett et al. (1996) ‘Evidence Based Medicine: What It Is And What It Isn’t: It’s About Integrating Individual Clinical Expertise And The Best External Evidence’,
BMJ: British Medical Journal, 312(7023), pp. 71–72. Available at:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/29730277.
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Greenhalgh, T., Howick, J. and Maskrey, N. (2014) ‘Evidence based medicine: a movement in crisis?’,
BMJ, 348(jun13 4), pp. g3725–g3725. Available at:
https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.g3725.
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PRISMA (no date). PRISMA. Available at:
http://www.prisma-statement.org/.
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Booth, A. (2006) ‘"Brimful of STARLITE”: toward standards for reporting literature searches’,
Journal of the Medical Library Association, 94(4). Available at:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1629442/.
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Sandberg, J. and Alvesson, M. (2011) ‘Ways of constructing research questions: gap-spotting or problematization?’,
Organization, 18(1), pp. 23–44. Available at:
https://org.sagepub.com/content/18/1/23.abstract.
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Booth, Andrew (2006) ‘Clear and present questions: formulating questions for evidence based practice’, Library Hi Tech, 24(3), pp. 355–368.
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Wildridge, V. and Bell, L. (2002) ‘How CLIP became ECLIPSE: a mnemonic to assist in searching for health policy/management information’,
Health Information and Libraries Journal, 19(2), pp. 113–115. Available at:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1046/j.1471-1842.2002.00378.x/abstract.
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The above list is indicative of the essential reading for the course.
The library makes provision for all reading list items, with digital provision where possible, and these resources are shared between students.
Further reading can be obtained from this module's
reading list.
Assessment items, weightings and deadlines
| Coursework / exam |
Description |
Deadline |
Coursework weighting |
| Coursework |
OT: Portfolio |
21/04/2025 |
100% |
| Coursework |
SLT: Portfolio |
28/04/2025 |
100% |
Additional coursework information
Both the formative and summative submissions will be via FASER.
Formative
You may produce a formative submission for small group tutor-led discussion and feedback in week 7. This can take the format of an outline of your topic, a selection of the evidence you have appraised (in the table) and a brief justification for your chosen research activity option.
Summative
A single, submitted written assignment in workbook form (word count 3000 words max).
Your work will include:
- An introduction to the nature of the topic investigated and a justification of its relevance to your own and inter-professional practice.
- A literature search identifying database use, keywords, inclusion and exclusion criteria for the literature included and rationale for this criteria.
- PRISMA flow diagram.
- An evaluation of the literature sourced set out in table form, including appraisal tools used and summary of resulting critique/outcome.
- The identification of a potential knowledge gap.
- Plan of proposed area for ongoing research activity, with justification for one of the following directions of study: literature review with proposal/service development, small research project, scoping review or case study timeline for the plan and resources required.
Exam format definitions
- Remote, open book: Your exam will take place remotely via an online learning platform. You may refer to any physical or electronic materials during the exam.
- In-person, open book: Your exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer to any physical materials such as paper study notes or a textbook during the exam. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
- In-person, open book (restricted): The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer only to specific physical materials such as a named textbook during the exam. Permitted materials will be specified by your department. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
- In-person, closed book: The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may not refer to any physical materials or electronic devices during the exam. There may be times when a paper dictionary,
for example, may be permitted in an otherwise closed book exam. Any exceptions will be specified by your department.
Your department will provide further guidance before your exams.
Overall assessment
Reassessment
Module supervisor and teaching staff
Prof Fay Crawford, email: fay.crawford@essex.ac.uk.
Dr Anna Pettican (OT), Dr Anna Caute (SLT), Dr Alex Kaley, Dr Matumo Ramafikeng
hscslt@essex.ac.uk hscotadmin@essex.ac.uk
No
No
No
Prof Gary Morgan
city university
professor psychology
Dr Sunny Chan
UWE Bristol
Senior Lecturer
Available via Moodle
Of 23 hours, 23 (100%) hours available to students:
0 hours not recorded due to service coverage or fault;
0 hours not recorded due to opt-out by lecturer(s), module, or event type.
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