The first stage of any evidence-based research is formulating an answerable question. A well-formulated question will facilitate the search for evidence and will assist you in determining whether the evidence is relevant to your question.
An answerable question has a format that follows the PICO concept. The acronym translates to:
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Example: |
P (Problem or Patient or Population) | hospital acquired infection |
I (intervention/indicator) | hand washing |
C (comparison) | no hand washing; other solution; masks |
O (outcome of interest) | reduced infection |