Do Doctors Resist Reform? The Case of Evidence-Based Medical Practice
Many school reformers blame teachers for supporting the status quo and resisting change. In a previous post (April 30, 2011), I argued that, sure, many teachers question classroom-directed policies coming from top officials who last set foot in a classroom when they were high school seniors. And, yes, many teachers point out defects in the innovative program, curriculum, or software that designers missed. Being a skeptic of a new policy or program, however, is not rejecting change per se since teachers have altered their lessons and activities over the years while introducing new ways of teaching familiar topics. If this is the case for teachers, what about physicians who also have been accused of resisting a major reform introduced two decades ago called evidence-based medical practice.
EVIDENCE-BASED MEDICINE (EBM)
When a doctor sees a patient, takes a history, does a physical examination, and listens to what the patient