IS THERE AN EVIDENCE BASE FOR THE PRACTICE OF ENT SURGERY

In order to assess the strength of the 'evidence base' for the practic e of otolaryngology a review of recent journal articles was undertaken . A review of all articles published during the period 1990-1994 in fi ve major general otolaryngology journals was performed. The articles w ere classified according to a standardized scheme from the abstract or , if necessary, the full paper. Papers were grouped into observational studies (descriptive or analytical, hypothesis-testing), controlled t rials, randomized controlled trials, audits, non-clinical and others. One true meta-analysis was found.(1) Randomized controlled trials comp rised 0.7%-4% of articles across the journals studied; other controlle d trials comprised 0.8-2%; and other analytical studies 7.6-21.9%. Ver y few true audits were seen. Descriptive studies were by far the commo nest type of paper seen. This literature review suggests there is a po or evidence base for our specialty if one regards randomized controlle d trials as the gold standard.