Critical appraisal is the process of systematically questioning and critiquing the quality of evidence to assess its credibility and relevance to the context. This training package covers content on how to approach critical appraisal, as well as a selection of tools from different sources to support critical appraisal in practice. The supplementary materials at the end are for optional further reading.
Key learning objectives include:
undertaking critical appraisal of intervention studies;
undertaking critical appraisal of systematic reviews;
undertaking critical appraisal of qualitative studies;
applying the appropriate checklist tool to critically appraise different types of study designs.
Critical appraisal skills
The modules presented by this online course provide guidance and hands-on practice for critically appraising 3 different types of evidence – intervention studies, systematic reviews and qualitative studies.
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Topic |
Source |
Title |
Format |
Duration |
Cost and access |
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Critical appraisal of intervention studies, systematic reviews and qualitative studies |
National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools/McMaster University |
How NCCMT’s Learning Centre Supports Evidence-Informed Public Health Please review all content in modules: 4. Critical appraisal of intervention studies 5. Critical appraisal of systematic reviews 7. Critical appraisal of qualitative studies
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Online course |
9–12 hours |
Free with registration and login |
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Practical ways to critically appraise scientific literature |
edX MOOC by MDAnderson Center |
CERTaIN: Knowledge Synthesis: Systematic Reviews and Clinical Decision Making |
Online course | 3-4 weeks | Free for a limited amount of time |
Checklists for critical appraisal
The below tools offer a variety of checklists to apply when undertaking critical appraisal. Each source offers different checklists for different study designs.
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Topic |
Source |
Title |
Format |
Cost and access |
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Systematic reviews |
AMSTAR |
Tool |
Free, no login required |
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Systematic reviews, diagnostics; prognosis, RCTs, qualitative studies, and Individual Patient Data (IPD) reviews |
Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine/University of Oxford |
Tool |
Free, no login required |
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Systematic reviews, RCTs, cohort studies, case control studies, economic evaluations, diagnostic studies, qualitative studies and Clinical Prediction Rule |
Critical Appraisal Skills Program (CASP) |
Tool |
Free, no login required |
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Systematic reviews, RCTs, cohort studies, case control studies, economic evaluations, qualitative research, analytical cross sectional studies, case reports, case series, diagnostic test accuracy studies, prevalence studies, quasi-experimental studies and text and opinion |
Joanna Briggs Institute |
Tool |
Free, no login required |
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Case control and cohort studies |
The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute |
The Newcastle-Ottawa Scale (NOS) for assessing the quality of nonrandomised studies in meta-analyses |
Tool |
Free, no login required |
Supplementary materials
All supplementary materials are optional. The text material below provides scenarios to support application of what you have learnt
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Topic |
Source |
Title |
Format |
Duration |
Cost and access |
|
Systematic review |
SUPPORT project |
SUPPORT Tools for evidence-informed health Policymaking (STP) Please read: SUPPORT Tools for evidence-informed health Policymaking (STP) 8: Deciding how much confidence to place in a systematic review. |
Text |
1 hour |
Free, no login required |
| This talk will present a simple effective appraisal system based on two first steps to rapidly appraise and sift the evidence for its relevance and application to actual patient care, prior to assessing its validity. | Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine/University of Oxford | Critical Appraisal and EBM in the Real World | Podcast | 50 minutes | Free |