Background
Evidence-based medicine (EBM) is an established approach in clinical medicine to find the best way to solve problems in practice. By posing questions and answering those with evidence from scientific research, practitioners improve the quality of health care. It has been shown that this approach is also feasible for occupational health problems. In short, the approach consists of the following four steps: transform questions arising from practice into answerable questions, retrieve evidence from the literature by searching medical databases, interpret the results of the articles and apply them to the problem at hand.

Objectives
The course will focus on the application of the evidence-based approach to occupational health problems as encountered in the daily practice of occupational health professionals. It also aims at giving a better understanding of what constitutes evidence in occupational health and how it can be appraised.

The course will give the participants an opportunity to work on their own problems in small groups in addition to a systematic overview of critical appraisal skills.

After the course the participants will be able to
• understand what is evidence-based professional occupational health practice 
• ask relevant questions originating from professional practice
• reformulate questions from practice to enable answers from scientific or evidence-based information sources 
• perform a focused search in the Medline database using the PubMed search engine
• critically appraise the value of scientific articles resulting from the PubMed search
• understand the value of Cochrane Systematic Reviews and Clinical Practice Guidelines
• apply the results to their own practice.

Target group
Practitioners from occupational health services, preferably with some knowledge of epidemiology and medicine; Researchers with interest in the practice of evidence-based methods

Main topics
• Introduction to evidence-based occupational health practice
• Formulating answerable questions
• Searching the literature by using PubMed, the Cochrane Library, other databases
• Critical appraisal of research articles on intervention/prevention, etiology, prognosis, diagnosis, costs
• Critical appraisal of Cochrane Systematic Reviews and Practice Guidelines
• Applying results to practice

Minor themes
Clinical epidemiology, literature search, Cochrane Systematic Reviews, translating research to practice, practice guidelines.

Course description
The course is planned to last two and a half days, starting on Monday morning. Lectures on critical appraisal will be alternated with answering questions from practice. The answering of own questions will be organised in the form of small group work, and the critical appraisal in the form of classes with an experienced lecturer.

Literature
Straus et al. Evidence-based Medicine. How to practice and teach EBM. Churchill Livingstone 2005.
Verbeek J and van Dijk F (editors). How to use research information to improve the quality of occupational health practice. WHO 2005.

Course committee
Jos Verbeek and Jani Ruotsalainen, Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, Finland

Location and accommodation
The course will be held in Kuopio at Best Western Hotel Savonia. Kuopio is situated approximately 400 km from Helsinki, and it is the biggest city in eastern Finland. Kuopio can be reached in less than an hour by air from Helsinki, and there are frequent train connections from Helsinki to Kuopio. For more information please visit www.kuopioinfo.fi
Hotel Savonia is a cosy hotel located close to the University of Kuopio, the scientific park and the Puijo recreation area. The city centre offers services and shops within walking distance of the hotel.
Rooms have been reserved for the participants from Sunday 28 February until Wednesday 3 March. The full board price from Monday to Wednesday including accommodation, breakfast, lunch, conference coffees and dinner amounts to EUR 415. For arrival on Sunday an additional cost of EUR 94 will be charged (incl. single room and breakfast). The price of a so called day-package, including lunch and coffees is EUR 32/person/day. More information on the hotel can be found at: www.savonia.com

Registration deadline
28 January 2010. Please register at www.niva.org/registration
A confirmation letter will be sent to the participants after the registration deadline.

Registration fee
EUR 400 (accommodation and meals are not included in this price).

Language
The language of the course is English.

Course leader   
Jos Verbeek, MD, PhD 
Finnish Institute of Occupational Health 
Cochrane Occupational Health Field 
P.O. Box 93 
FI-70101 Kuopio, FINLAND 
Tel. +358 30 474 7289 
E-mail: jos.verbeek@ttl.fi

Course coordinator
Annika Bärlund, NIVA
Topeliuksenkatu 41 a A
00250 Helsinki
Finland
Tel. +358 30 474 2333
E-mail: annika.barlund@ttl.fi


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