Evidence-Based Practice and Research
Evidence-Based Practice and Research tests whether you can formulate a clinical question, appraise evidence, and apply it to prosthodontic decisions. The exam favors critical reasoning over slogan-based practice.
Core rules
- Use PICO: population, intervention, comparison, outcome.
- Hierarchy matters: systematic reviews and randomized trials generally outrank case reports for therapy questions.
- Appraise validity, bias, confounding, precision, and applicability before changing practice.
- Survival and success are not interchangeable; define the outcome and follow-up.
- Absolute effects, confidence intervals, and number needed to treat are more useful than isolated p-values.
Worked example
A clinician asks whether screw-retained implant crowns have fewer complications than cement-retained crowns. Reasoning: form a PICO question; search for systematic reviews and randomized trials; compare biologic and mechanical complications; assess follow-up and bias. If evidence is low certainty, present it as conditional rather than definitive and discuss patient factors such as retrievability and esthetics.
Traps that cost marks
- Confusing statistical significance with clinical importance.
- Relying on a single small study.
- Ignoring confounding and publication bias.
- Mixing surrogate outcomes with patient-important outcomes.
- Applying evidence without checking patient applicability.