Campus News

National experts in evidence-based medicine to speak at UGA conference May 10-11

National experts in evidence-based medicine to speak at UGA conference May 10-11

Athens, Ga. – Two of the nation’s top experts in teaching evidence-based medicine will speak to a wide cross-section of University of Georgia faculty members in a conference

hosted by UGA’s Evidence-Based Program for Health Professions Education May 10-11.

David Slawson, a professor of family medicine and vice chair for academic affairs at the University of Virginia, will deliver a lecture titled, Teaching Evidence-Based Medicine: Should We Be Teaching Information Management Instead? from 4-5 p.m. on Monday, May 10 at the Georgia Center for Continuing Education Conference Center and Hotel.

Allen F. Shaughnessy, a professor of family medicine at Tufts University and associate director of the Tufts University Family Medicine Residency at Cambridge Health Alliance, will present a lecture titled, Teaching Evidence-Based Practice in Health Professions Education: Barriers and Solutions, from 11 a.m.-noon on Tuesday, May 11 at the UGA College of Pharmacy.

Slawson and Shaughnessy were awarded the Innovative Program Award by the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine in 2002 for their work. The two developed a paradigm called Information Mastery, the ability to develop effective and efficient ways of identifying, evaluating and using new information. The Center for Information Mastery at the University of Virginia develops processes to create, access and evaluate knowledge, and efficiently deliver that knowledge to health care professionals, patients and the community.

The center also helps academic faculty from all health care disciplines develop the skills necessary to teach the concepts of information mastery to medical students, residents, faculty and practicing clinicians through the designing of formal curricula for specific specialties and health care disciplines, as well as specific evaluation techniques to assess the success of these efforts.

Tuesday morning, the conference will feature discussion among participants on common issues in teaching evidence-based practice, followed by small group discussions on issues and strategies they develop.

The afternoon will feature workshops on issues in evidence-based practice such as:

  • Teaching Evidence-Based Practice

  • Integrating Evidence into Formulary Decisions

  • Critical Thinking and Evidence-Based Practice

  • Informatics to Support Evidence-Based Practice

  • Flawed Transmission of the Best Evidence: What Should We Know About the Treatment of Type 2 diabetes? 

The conference is organized by UGA’s Evidence-Based Program for Health Professions Education, a partnership involving faculty from the College of Education, the College of Public Health and other UGA units that study, develop and provide evidence-based education for health professionals. The conference is supported by the College of Education, the College of Public Health and its Institute of Gerontology, and the President’s Venture Fund.

For more information, see http://ebp.uga.edu/conference/.