Response to Letter to the Editor re ‘Physiotherapists’ abilities to undertake the evidence based practice steps: a scoping review’

Dear Editor,

Re: “Ability of physiotherapists to undertake evidence-based practice steps: a scoping review”. Physiotherapy (United Kingdom) 2015;102:10–9. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.physio.2015.06.003.

We would like to acknowledge the work and role that PEDro has provided for many years and look forward to using it for many more.

In response to the point that ‘the high usage of the PEDro evidence resource suggests that many physiotherapists do engage in EBP to address their clinical questions’, we wish to clarify that our aims were to determine the abilities of physiotherapists to conduct the EBP steps, originally proposed, that is, to Ask, Acquire, Appraise, Apply and Assess [1]. From the available literature, all these steps together did not appear to be commonplace.

However, the high use of PEDro [2] (and the internet in general) does suggest that physiotherapists are inquisitive and do engage in behaviors to improve their knowledge, skills or practice. The forthcoming paper [3]cited suggests that skimming or brief searches are more commonplace than the formalized steps originally proposed.

We ask; ‘is it enough to scan the internet to confirm a course of action? “A recent editorial called for the profession to embrace the relative new concept of ‘implementation science’ so that the acquisition of knowledge is more than passive dissemination or quick scan. Knowledge can be improved and acquired through different avenues [4]. The suggestions by Jette offer clinicians other opportunities to evaluate knowledge. The challenge for the profession is to define what is evidence based or evidence informed physiotherapy [5].

We welcome the comments offered and wish the PEDro team continued success.

Response to Letter to the Editor re ‘Physiotherapists’ abilities to undertake the evidence based practice steps: a scoping review’