Survey of Evidence-Based Practice Use and Understanding Among Final (5 th ) Year Medical Students in South-East Asia

The SEA-ORCHID project (South East Asia Optimising Reproductive Child Health in Developing countries) initiated a survey among undergraduate medical students at five South-East Asia universities to ascertain their understanding of evidence-based practice, information seeking practices, access to Information Technology and evidencebased databases as well as their understanding of clinical practice guidelines. The survey took place during August to December 2006 and was completed by 172 fifth year undergraduate medical students. The findings from this survey indicate that fifth year undergraduate medical students from the participating five South East Asian universities need to be well equipped in knowing what databases exist, how to search these and how to critically appraise the information obtained. This need, plus a lack of exposure to clinical practice guideline appraisal and development, highlights some of the issues medical students encounter when attempting to learn and practice evidence-based practice effectively.