Critique

Critiquing evidence leads to its evaluation. Evaluation of the evidence includes determination of its merit, feasibility and utility as a basis for making a practice change. The emphasis in this phase is on appraisal of findings since these are the knowledge products under consideration (Polit & Beck, 2008).

Goal

The goal is to evaluate the scientific merit and potential clinical applicability of each study's findings, and with a group of studies covering similar problem areas, to determine what findings have a strong enough basis to be used in practice.

Manuscripts Evaluated

Manuscripts evaluated may be the original research studies or integrative reviews/meta-analyses.

Process

• Critiquing Tools
• Levels of Evidence
• Credibility of Web Sites
• Critiquing Abstracts
• Critiquing an Integrated Review
• Critiquing Clinical Practice Guidelines
• Critiquing a Quality Improvement Report

A team approach is best and the work can be divided in many ways. In 1994, at an ONS Congress Symposium "Empowering the Nurse: Applying New Findings to Clinical Practice," Marie Whedon suggested that an RU Project Group involve two groups with overlapping members.

• Literature review group makes recommendations from the literature to the application group.
• Application group provides clinical outcomes and implementation strategies.

Continue to Step 3.1 - Critiquing Tools

Continue to Step 4 - Summarize the Evidence