Journal Club - Critically Appraised Topics

Practice-Based Learning and Improvement

Guidelines for Presenters Examples CAT Template (Word doc)

2008 - 2009 Schedule

Guidelines for Presenters

Journal Club is scheduled as a noon conference with the specific day varying from site to site:  UMMC and CH-MPLS third Thursday of the month, HCMC 3rd or 4th week, and CHSP 3rd week of the month.  Please give this some forethought and preparation. Listed below is the general timeline of how Journal Club should be prepared.  

1. During the first week of the rotation, you will develop a clinical question about a topic you are interested in learning more about.  For example, “Is it acceptable to treat the first UTI in a child as an outpatient?”

2. Over the next week, you will search for an article that best addresses your clinical question.  Please let us know as soon as you have chosen an article so we may distribute them to the other residents before Journal Club.  Although, most people do not read the article beforehand, there is always 2 or 3 residents who do; the dialogue you and these residents generate are essential to a good presentation.

3. Presenters should use the  EBM toolkit found online at    www.med.ualberta.ca/ebm to help guide their presentation. On the website there is an "Appraisal Guide" and "Worksheet" specific for each type of study that may be reviewed (i.e., therapy/prevention, diagnosis, harm, prognosis, clinical practice guidelines, systematic review). Find the appropriate guide and worksheet under the tabs "Domains", "CPG", or "Systematic Review".)

4. Over the following week (the week of Journal Club), you will create your presentation in the CAT format (Critically Appraised Topic), however technically it will be more of a “Critically Appraised Article”.

5. An electronic copy of the CAT is to be emailed to a chief resident, which will then be posted on the resident web page.  Assistance may be obtained from any Chief or from Drs. James Nixon and Brad Benson.

• Further Guidelines for Presenters

Return to Top