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Ask a clinical question

Ask a clinical question

To find the best evidence you need to:

  • Translate a knowledge gap into a well built clinical question 
  • Establish what type of question you have 
  • Choose which type of study will best answer your question

PICOT is one framework for building a clinical question.

The following resources will step you through the process of creating an answerable question:

Formulate a clinical question
Self-directed online tutorial (from the University of Western Australia, Faculty of health and medical sciences)

PICOT part 1 / PICOT part 2
Two videos produced by Wolters Kluwer - providers of Ovid databases

You can also consider alternatives to PICO. This academic paper outlines some alternatives including COPES, ECLIPSE, PIPOH, PECODR etc) based on field of study (eg: medicine, OT, social work, speech pathology, oncology etc).

Introduction to Evidence-Based Practice from Duke University Medical Center Library and the Health Sciences Library at University of North Carolina