Evidence-Based Practice in Aphasia Treatment

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Total Course Timing: 75 Minutes

Evidence-based practice (EBP) relates to how clinicians make assessment and treatment decisions with patients and families. EBP is taught in graduate programs in speech-language pathology. However, as students become practicing clinicians working in fast-paced, contemporary clinical environments, obstacles arise that may prevent consistent, active engagement in EBP. The intent of this course is to discuss EBP and practice-based evidence, provide a model for how to find evidence and determine its quality and relevance, and present suggestions for using the evidence to support good clinical decisions. Several readily available, easy to use tools for finding and evaluating evidence will be demonstrated. At the end of this course, the learner will have knowledge and skills that are readily transferable to clinical practice in any contemporary clinical speech-language pathology’s practice in hospitals, rehabilitation facilities, skilled nursing facilities, or home health care settings.

Meet your instructor

Janet Patterson

Janet Patterson is chief of the the Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Service at the VA in Northern California. Prior to that, she held academic positions as faculty member, associate dean, and department chair at California State University East Bay, Central Michigan University, and Michigan State University. With…

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Chapters & learning objectives

1. Defining Evidence

Evidence appears in multiple forms and it is crucial that clinicians understand the types of evidence as well as information that is not considered evidence. This chapter defines various forms of evidence and gives examples of information that may be important, such as opinion, but which is not evidence.

2. Locating Evidence

Evidence appears in many forms, such as reports of original clinical research, synthesized research reports, practice-based evidence, and anecdotal evidence, all of which are readily available at libraries, professional repositories, and on the Internet. This chapter describes the locations of evidence, how to access those locations, and the types of evidence within them. It also reviews how to conduct as precise a search as possible to maximize results and minimize search time as well as potential factors impeding an efficient search.

3. Evaluating the Quality of the Evidence

Evidence has proliferated in its various forms. Not all evidence is of the highest quality or will give the user confidence in incorporating recommendations from evidence into clinical practice, and clinicians must be able to make a judgment about the evidence. Many systems exist to evaluate evidence; the challenge is to select the evaluation system that best matches the evidence. Several of these systems will be reviewed in this chapter and their application demonstrated.

4. Evidence-Based Practice and Practice-Based Evidence

The term evidence-based practice (EBP) is likely familiar to listeners, as it has been at the forefront of evidence evaluation for several years. The primary activity in EBP is gathering information from specific sources (e.g. relevant literature) for review. One might consider EBP a top-down process. In contrast, practice-based evidence (PBE) examines current clinical practice that utilizes rigorous research design principles to gather data about current practice, answer questions that arise from that practice, and subsequently inform future practice. This chapter will describe the principles of PBE and describe a few examples of application.

More courses in this series

Engaging Persons with Aphasia in Community Resources

Janet Patterson and Jacqueline Hinckley