Evidence-based medicine for the wards

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Pardon me for a quick plug for evidence-based medicine on the medicine wards.

I'm a medicine resident in Northern California and have been really impressed with some of the fourth year medical students that have rotated with us. I've noticed a rising trend among the stronger subinterns/acting interns -- they're easy going, easy to work with, great with patients, they take the initiative, get their work done, help the team in unexpected ways, give superb presentations, have a solid fund of knowledge, and offer their knowledge in confident yet almost paradoxically humble ways. I suspect that most SDN medical students are practicing and almost have these skills down pat. I say that with relative confidence because the absolutely crazy thing is that these qualities are becoming the rule rather than the exception. So fourth years have to find a way to differentiate themselves.

One of the amazing tricks I've seen from some students is to have a handful of trials under their belts -- for example, AFFIRM, UKPDS, V-HeFT, PIOPED II, and RALES. These trials come up sooooo often because they're related to afib, diabetes, CHF, and PEs, and it's often crazy impressive when a fourth year medical student either casually cites one of these articles or at least has a basic understanding of the trial's question, its design, and its major results. The problem is that it can be challenging to read through all of these trials, and it might be difficult for an EBM newbie to understand the trial in detail.

To address this, a small group of residents (myself included) have released an app called Journal Club for iPhone that puts summaries of these major landmark trials at your fingertips. Get to know the clinical literature, be a rock star on the wards, and spend your time where it's needed most: taking care of patients. Head over to journalclubapp.com and grab your copy of the app for less than a cup of coffee.

Seems interesting. I hope it is useful next year.

android?

Yep, an android app is in the works.

Get it while it's cheap! Journal Club for iPhone costs a buck, but that preposterous price won't last long. Head to http://journalclubapp.com right now!