Making Sense of Evidence Workshops

At PenCLAHRC we believe that better health care can be provided to patients by making decisions that are based on evidence.

Our Making Sense of Evidence (MSE) workshops are designed to teach you how to find and use evidence to make effective health and social care decisions.

Sarah Dean, Associate Professor at the University of Exeter Medical School and academic lead for MSE, explains further:

The training

Our workshops are modelled on those run at the Centre for Evidence Based Practice in Oxford and are subsidised by PenCLAHRC.

During our standard Making Sense of Evidence workshop you will:

• Formulate a focused question
• Track down and organise the best evidence
• Gain experience of critically appraising the evidence
• Understand the application of evidence in practice
• Evaluate the effectiveness and efficiency of your educational process

For detailed information on the workshops we offer, visit the MSE Modules page.

Edmund Jack, General Practitioner and Course Tutor, gives a short example of the kind of challenges the MSE training can help you tackle:

Workshop feedback

Below is a selection of feedback from participants who have attended previous workshops:

"A fantastic, concise introduction with good pointers on where to go next to keep learning. Thank you, very interesting and good discussions.”

"Really well organised workshop that helped to reinforce how evidence based medicine can be put into practice."

Upcoming workshops

Details of upcoming workshops can be found on our events page. To discuss scheduling a bespoke session for your organisation, please contact us:  Email

Sample course material

A selection of the course materials is available to download below:

• Sample programme: Making Sense of Evidence: Using Research to Inform Clinical Decision Making
• Sample Programme: Making Sense of Evidence: Understanding Diagnostic Studies
• Presentation: Formulating a Focused Question
• Critical appraisal of an RCT
• Critical Appraisal of a Systematic Review
• Searching checklist
• Paper by AK Akobeng - Principles of Evidence Based Medicine
• The GATE frame: critical appraisal with pictures

For more information on the course content, please visit the MSE Modules page.

You can also download our Making Sense of Evidence flyer (PDF).