This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Reply to article  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Citing articles on ISI (2)  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in this journal  Topic Collections  • Evidence-Based Medicine  • Informatics/ Internet in Medicine  • Internet  • Informatics, Other  • Journalology/ Peer Review/ Authorship  • Articles for Residents  • Alert me on articles by topic

Donald S. Fong, MD, MPH; Frederick L. Ferris III, MD

Arch Ophthalmol. 2001;119:585-589.

One challenge for ophthalmologists entering the 21st century will be to make clinical decisions based on valid information or evidence rather than intuition, hearsay, or peer practice. The practice of ophthalmology has been information based since its inception. However, before the development of modern clinical study design and statistics, ophthalmologists had been applying information from all sources to their practice, without regard to its quality. Subconsciously, many practitioners may give equal weight to the printed word, no matter the source. Because of an information explosion, ophthalmologists must now pick and choose evidence from a mountain of published information. How can this be done efficiently?

From the Departments of Ophthalmology, Southern California Permanente Medical Group, Baldwin Park, and University of California at Los Angeles School of Medicine (Dr Fong); and the Division of Biometry and Epidemiology, National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md (Dr Ferris).