EBM I Assignment Guide for Anhui University Students (Archived): Literaure Review Rubric

Email your paper and your two articles to Professor McEwen. Papers are due on October 16th at 5 pm. You are not required to submit a TurnItIn report.

Article Requirement (2 points)

• Utilized 1 research article and 1 review article - You will receive 1 point for using a research article and 1 point for using a review article.

Quality of Writing (4 points)

• Few spelling and punctuation errors (1 point)

• Few grammatical errors (1 point)

• Writing was organized, clear, and concise  (1 point)

• Paper is 2-3 pages in length (Cover page is optional. Cover page and literature cited section can be on additional pages over the 3 page limit). (1 point)

Introduction (3 points)

• Objective of paper is clearly defined (1 point) - What is the purpose of your paper? What is the the clinical question that you are answering?
• Provided background information on disease / condition and the drugs (2 points) - Provide a few sentences introducing the reader to the disease/condition. Think about the prevalence or how the disease is diagnosed or treated. Discuss the drugs that will be discussed in paper. Write a few sentences about the drug classes or indications or mechanism of actions for the drugs.

Research Article (11 points)

• Objective of study provided (1 point) - What was the purpose of the study?
• Clinical research design of the study described (1 point) - What type of study is it? Examples of research designs include randomized control trials, cohort studies, secondary analysis studies, etc.
• Type of blinding (1 point) - Is the study single or double-blinded? Is it an open label study?
• Funding (1 point) - Who funded the study? Was the funding by governmental, pharmaceutical companies, other grants, etc.
• Sample size provided (1 point) - What was the sample size for the study?
• Inclusion/exclusion criteria provided (1 point) - List these criteria. If they are numerous, which are the most important to pharmacists and patients?
• All primary outcomes and important secondary outcomes provided (1 point) - List the outcomes. May be called endpoints in some studies.
• Methods described (1 point) - List the methods.
• Results described (1 point) - List the results.
• Important statistical results discussed (1 point) - Describe the statistical results for the primary outcomes and important statistical outcomes.
• Conclusions of the authors summarized (1 point) - This is not the same as the results. Why does the author believe this study is important?

Discussion (8 points, 2 points each):

• Research article critique ( 2 points) - Critique the research article.
• Strengths and weaknesses given (2 points) - What was good about the article? How could the article be improved?

• Importance of the topic to medicine / pharmacy (2 points) - Was this study important to pharmacy? Will it change how pharmacists care for patients?

• Apply results to clinical practice. Are there other factors that may influence the choice of one or both of these drugs/treatments (2 points) -  Are there other factors that might affect the applicability of the study to patient care? Think about drug costs, adverse reactions, drug interactions, drug availability, etc.

Literature Cited Section (2 points):

• Literature properly cited within the text of the paper (1 point)

• Literature properly cited using the National Library of Medicine style within the literature cited section of the paper (1 point)