Developing an electronic resources evaluation framework for evidence-based education in medical sciences

Evidence-based education is the use of the best scientific evidence in all aspects of education and integration of professional knowledge with empirical evidence in education. There is little desire to use electronic evidence in education for reasons such as lack of access to credible scientific resources and lack of time. The purpose of this study was to design an electronic resources evaluation framework for evidence-based education in medical sciences.

This applied descriptive study was performed by Delphi method. The statistical population consisted of 12 specialists in evidence-based medicine, medical education, social medicine, medical librarianship and information, medical informatics and health information management of Tabriz University of Medical Sciences and some other universities. The data collection tool was a researcher-made checklist. The Excel software was used for analyzing the data and CVR and CVI indices were calculated for each data set.

Finally, of 182 criteria in the initial checklist, 60 criteria were approved by experts and entered the framework. The criteria related to the recovery and website services received the highest score by the specialists. The criteria of coverage, efficiency, hyperlink and guideline were omitted from the final framework due to not obtaining the required score.

The present study resulted in developing a framework of criteria for evaluating electronic resources of evidence-based education with 60 criteria for evaluating electronic resources of evidence-based education in medical sciences.