Knowledge, Attitude and Practice Regarding Evidence Based Medicine among Physicians in Tertiary Care Hospitals in Aseer Region, Saudi Arabia

Aim of Study: To assess tertiary care physician s knowledge, attitudes and practices regarding Evidence Based Medicine (EBM).Subject and Methods: The study included 351 physicians working at tertiary health care hospitals in Aseer Region. Data were collected through a specially designed questionnaire to assess the factors affecting knowledge, attitude and practice of EBM.Results: All respondents were aware regarding the concept of EBM. However, 53.8% of them had poor knowledge, but 62% had a positive attitude toward EBM. Traditional sources of information are used by most physician during their daily work. Except the PubMed, most physicians were not aware of EBM extracting journals, review publications or databases. Most technical terms were not well understood by participants. Physicians knowledge, attitude and practice were significantly affected by their personal characteristics (age, gender, nationality and position).Conclusions: Educational training and textbooks are the highest sources of information that the sample uses in day-to-day practice. Physicians have poor knowledge regarding EBM scientific terms. Physicians attitude regarding EBM is mostly positive.Recommendations: THC physicians should be encouraged to attend EBM training courses and workshops, and to be part of their educational activities as well as the requirements for their promotions, or renewing their contracts. Management should support the EBM culture, training EBM related facilities including libraries, well equipped clinics, computers, internet access, subscription in medical journals and medical databases websites.