Is hybrid-PBL advancing teaching in biomedicine? A systematic review

BACKGROUND

The impact of instructional guidance on learning outcomes in higher biomedical education is subject of intense debate. There is the teacher-centered or traditional way of teaching (TT) and, on the other side, the notion that students learn best under minimal guidance such as problem-based learning (PBL). Although the benefits of PBL are well-known, there are aspects susceptible to improvement. Hence, a format merging TT and PBL (hybrid-PBL, h-PBL) may advance education in biomedical sciences.

METHODS

Studies that employed h-PBL in higher biomedical education compared to TT and/or pure PBL were systematically reviewed. Specifically, this review addressed the following question: does h-PBL in biomedical sciences result in superior marks and a better student's perception of the teaching and learning process?

RESULTS

We found that the use of h-PBL in higher biomedical sciences was superior compared to TT and pure-PBL. This was evidenced by the higher performance of the students in h-PBL as well as the level of student's satisfaction as compared to TT or pure PBL.

CONCLUSIONS

These findings encourage more research on investigating the pedagogical benefits of h-PBL. In addition, these data support an eclectic system in which the pedagogical tools from TT and PBL are used cooperatively in the best interest of the education and satisfaction of the students.

Current situation of HIV research in Spain

Prevention, early detection, clinical follow-up, organisation and management are key elements in the chal-lenges to be addressed in the field of HIV infection in Spain. In addition to these aspects, research repre-sents a transversal element that is highly relevant for building up a comprehensive response against HIV infection. The evolution of HIV/AIDS research in Spain, major milestones and the development of scientific structures are analysed. An economic description of HIV/AIDS research funding in the context of the whole Spanish R&D system is made. In particular, the impact of the economic crisis and budget restrictions and their con-sequences on medical research are considered. Finally, different perspectives on the future of HIV/AIDS research in the global scientific situation are discussed.

CRISPR-cas System as a Genome Engineering Platform: Applications in Biomedicine and Biotechnology

Genome editing mediated by Clustered Regularly Interspaced Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR) and its associated proteins (Cas) has recently been considered to be used as efficient, rapid and site-specific tool in the modification of endogenous genes in biomedically important cell types and whole organisms. It has become a predictable and precise method of choice for genome engineering by specifying a 20-nt targeting sequence within its guide RNA. Firstly, this review aims to describe the biology of CRISPR system. Next, the applications of CRISPR-Cas9 in various ways, such as efficient generation of a wide variety of biomedically important cellular models as well as those of animals, modifying epigenomes, conducting genome-wide screens, gene therapy, labelling specific genomic loci in living cells, metabolic engineering of yeast and bacteria and endogenous gene expression regulation by an altered version of this system were reviewed.

Advanced biomedical applications of carbon nanotube

With advances in nanotechnology, the applications of nanomaterial are developing widely and greatly. The characteristic properties of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) make them the most selective candidate for various multi-functional applications. The greater surface area of the CNTs in addition to the capability to manipulate the surfaces and dimensions has provided greater potential for this nanomaterial. The CNTs possess greater potential for applications in biomedicine due to their vital electrical, chemical, thermal, and mechanical properties. The unique properties of CNT are exploited for numerous applications in the biomedical field. They are useful in both therapeutic and diagnostic applications. They form novel carrier systems which are also capable of site-specific delivery of therapeutic agents. In addition, CNTs are of potential application in biosensing. Many recently reported advanced systems of CNT could be exploited for their immense potential in biomedicine in the future.

Precision Medicine in Rhinosinusitis

PURPOSE OF REVIEW

Our scope is the presentation of research and clinical progresses in relation to precision medicine that are expected to alter our clinical practice in relation to chronic rhinosinusitis (CRS). Current knowledge on phenotypes and endotypes, biomarkers, and clinical markers for diagnosis, medical and surgical therapy, and prognosis is presented as well as the role of precision medicine in United Airway Disease and SCUAD (severe-uncontrolled chronic upper airway inflammation).

RECENT FINDINGS

Current technological progresses, mostly in relation to molecular biology and information technology, have permitted more detailed pathophysiological assessments and multidimensional approaches in airways diseases. Based on the concept of united airways diseases, new classification schemes, called endotypes, have been proposed for CRS. In addition, novel biological treatments that have been introduced for the treatment of asthma show great promise as well for severe uncontrolled cases of CRS with nasal polyps. Central to this approach are new biomarkers that are being examined in relation to complex bio-clinical traits of CRS. As this narrative review of the aforementioned precision medicine initiatives in relation to CRS advances, a modification of current practice is expected not only for severe chronic upper airways diseases in tertiary centers but also for milder and more common cases that are being encountered in the community.

Recent progress in the industrial and biomedical applications of tragacanth gum: A review

Natural polymers have distinct advantages over synthetic polymers because of their abundance, biocompatibility, and biodegradability. Tragacanth gum, an anionic polysaccharide, is a natural polymer which is derived from renewable sources. As a biomaterial, tragacanth gum has been used in industrial settings such as food packaging and water treatment, as well as in the biomedical field as drug carriers and for wound healing purposes. The present review provides an overview on the state-of-the-art in the field of tragacanth gum applications. The structure, properties, cytotoxicity, and degradability as well as the recent advances in industrial and biomedical applications of tragacanth gum are reviewed to offer a backdrop for future research.

Biomedicine, self and society: An agenda for collaboration and engagement

The commitment of massive resources - financial, social, organisational, and human - drives developments in biomedicine. Fundamental transformations in the generation and application of knowledge are challenging our understandings and experiences of health, illness, and disease as well as the organisation of research and care. Coupled with the accelerated pace of change, it is pressing that we build authentic collaborations across and between the biomedical sciences, humanities and social sciences, and wider society. It is only in this way that we can ask and answer the penetrating questions that will shape improvements in human health now and in the decades ahead. We delineate the need for such commitments across five key areas of human and societal experience that impact on and are impacted by developments in biomedicine: disease; bodies; global movements and institutions; law; and, science-society engagements. Interactions between ideas, researchers, and communities across and within these domains can provide a way into creating the new knowledges, methods, and partnerships we believe are essential if the promises of biomedicine are to be realised.

Noncoding RNAs Databases: Current Status and Trends

One of the most important resources for researchers of noncoding RNAs is the information available in public databases spread over the internet. However, the effective exploration of this data can represent a daunting task, given the large amount of databases available and the variety of stored data. This chapter describes a classification of databases based on information source, type of RNA, source organisms, data formats, and the mechanisms for information retrieval, detailing the relevance of each of these classifications and its usability by researchers. This classification is used to update a 2012 review, indexing now more than 229 public databases. This review will include an assessment of the new trends for ncRNA research based on the information that is being offered by the databases. Additionally, we will expand the previous analysis focusing on the usability and application of these databases in pathogen and disease research. Finally, this chapter will analyze how currently available database schemas can help the development of new and improved web resources.

Bioactivity Profiling of Plant Biodiversity of Panama by High Throughput Screening

We report relative bioactivities of extracts prepared from a large collection of plants from three national parks in Panama. Over 181 plants were collected, taxonomically identified and their detannified dichloromethane (DCM)-methanolic extracts were used for profiling selected bioactivities. Assays were performed to evaluate the antioxidant activity of the extracts for Antioxidant Response Element (ARE) induction, total non-enzymatic antioxidant potential, anti-inflammatory and anticancer properties. The high throughput analysis of 280 extracts resulted in identification of 57.5% of the extracts that could induce ARE at one or more concentrations tested, 93.5% that harbored total antioxidant capacity, and 2.1% of the extracts that showed lung cancer cell line-specific cytotoxicity. Data from our profiling experiments indicate that a large number of extracts could be a source for further isolation and chemical identification of compounds that could serve as leads for discovery of antioxidant, anticancer and anti-inflammatory agents to prevent or treat complex diseases like cancer and neurodegenerative disorders.

Blockchain Technologies: Opportunities for Solving Real-World Problems in Healthcare and Biomedical Sciences

Introduction:

Blockchain technology is associated with the financial industry, but it can be applied to other industries. The supporting architecture of blockchain has the immense potential to transform the delivery of healthcare, medical, clinical, and life sciences, due to the extended functionality and distinct features of its distributed ledger. The potential scale of impact is comparable to that seen with the introduction of TCP/IP. Blockchain technology has captured the interest of healthcare providers and biomedical scientists within various healthcare domains such as longitudinal healthcare records, automated claims, drug development, interoperability in population health, consumer health, patient portals, medical research, data security, and reducing costs with supply chain management. It is not yet clear if blockchain is going to disrupt healthcare, but healthcare organizations are monitoring its potential closely for prospective concepts like secure patient IDs. Realistically, the adoption and implementation of blockchains will be a gradual evolution over time, but now is the time to take a fresh look at its possibilities in healthcare and biomedical sciences. Blockchain technology revolutionary solutions are bringing us closer to the possibility of every patient record being able to send updates to an open-source, community-wide trusted ledger that is accessible and understood across organizations with guaranteed integrity.

Aim and Methods:

This paper discusses as a review some potential areas of opportunity for blockchain in the health and biomedical sciences fields.

Results and Conclusions:

This paper describes and synthesizes 20 examples of real-world use-case scenarios for blockchains in healthcare and biomedical practice.

Serum Exosome Isolation by Size-Exclusion Chromatography for the Discovery and Validation of Preeclampsia-Associated Biomarkers

Exosomes are extracellular nanovesicles of complex and heterogeneous composition that are released in biofluids such as blood. The interest in the characterization of exosomal biochemistry has increased over the last few years as they convey cellular proteins, lipids, and RNA that might reflect the biological or pathological condition of the source cell. In particular, association of changes of exosome proteins with specific pathogenic processes arises as a promising method to identify disease biomarkers as for the pregnancy-related preeclampsia. However, the overlapping physicochemical and structural characteristics of different types of extracellular vesicles have hindered the consolidation of universally accepted and standardized purification or enrichment protocols. Thus, it has been recently demonstrated that the exosomal protein profile resulting from in-depth proteomics analyses is highly dependent on the preparation protocol used, which will determine the particle type specificity and the presence/absence of contaminating proteins.In this chapter, an isolation method of serum exosomes based on size-exclusion chromatography (SEC) using qEV columns (Izon) is described. We show that this method is fast and reliable, as the population of exosomes isolated is homogeneous in terms of size, morphology, and protein composition. This exosome enrichment method is compatible with downstream qualitative and quantitative proteomic analysis of the samples.

Turning a blind eye and a deaf ear to traditional and complementary medicine practice does not make it go away: a qualitative study exploring perceptions and attitudes of stakeholders towards the integration of traditional and complementary medicine into medical school curriculum in Uganda

BACKGROUND

A substantial proportion of healthcare professionals have inadequate understanding of traditional and complementary medicine and often consider their use inappropriate.

METHODS

We conducted a qualitative study to understand the perceptions and attitudes of medical students, medical school faculty and traditional and complementary medicine practitioners. In-depth interviews and focus group discussions were used to collect data. Thematic approach was used in data analysis to identify emerging themes and sub themes. Data analysis was supported with use of Atlas.ti v6.1.1.

RESULTS

The majority of participants commended the inclusion of traditional and complementary medicine principles into medical school curricula. The main reasons advanced were that: patients are already using these medicines and doctors need to understand them; doctors would be more accommodating to use and not rebuke patients, thereby minimizing delays in care due to pursuit of alternative therapies; promote patient safety; foster therapeutic alliance and adherence to therapy; uphold patients' right to self-determination; lead to discovery of new drugs from traditional medicines; and set ground for regulation of practices and quality control. However, participants anticipated operational and ethical challenges that include inadequate number of faculty to teach the subject, congested curricula, increased costs in research and development to produce evidence-base data, obstruction by pharmaceutical companies, inaccessibility to and depletion of medicinal plants, and potential conflicts due to diversity in culture and values. A substantial minority of participants thought traditional medicine need not be taught in medical schools because there is lack of scientific evidence on efficacy, safety, and side effects profiles. These shortfalls could make the determination of benefits (beneficence) and harm (maleficence) difficult, as well as compromise the ability of physicians to adequately disclose benefits and harms to patients and family, thereby undermining the process of informed consent and patient autonomy.

CONCLUSIONS

Training medical students in principles of traditional and complementary medicine is considered reasonable, feasible, and acceptable; and could lead to improvement in health outcomes. There are anticipated challenges to implementing a hybrid medical school curricula, but these are surmountable and need not delay introducing traditional and complementary medicine principles into medical school curricula in Uganda.

Will Blockchain Technology Transform Healthcare and Biomedical Sciences?

With the rise of technology, modern healthcare and biomedical sciences have largely shifted their content to cyberspace. This raises the challenges of accessibility and security of such data, and the solution may lie in a recent technology called blockchain. Blockchain is a public transaction ledger that offers two unique capabilities, immutability and decentralization of data, that make it stand out as an unparalleled technology in the spheres of healthcare and biomedicine.

Molecular bionics - engineering biomaterials at the molecular level using biological principles

Life and biological units are the result of the supramolecular arrangement of many different types of molecules, all of them combined with exquisite precision to achieve specific functions. Taking inspiration from the design principles of nature allows engineering more efficient and compatible biomaterials. Indeed, bionic (from bion-, unit of life and -ic, like) materials have gained increasing attention in the last decades due to their ability to mimic some of the characteristics of nature systems, such as dynamism, selectivity, or signalling. However, there are still many challenges when it comes to their interaction with the human body, which hinder their further clinical development. Here we review some of the recent progress in the field of molecular bionics with the final aim of providing with design rules to ensure their stability in biological media as well as to engineer novel functionalities which enable navigating the human body.

Identifying strengths and weaknesses of the integration of biomedical and herbal medicine units in Ghana using the WHO Health Systems Framework: a qualitative study

Background

The use of herbal medicines in developing countries has been increasing over the years. In Ghana, since 2011, the government has been piloting the integration of herbal medicine in 17 public hospitals. However, the strengths and the weaknesses of the integration have not been fully explored. The current study sought to examine the strengths and weaknesses of the integration using the WHO health systems framework.

Methods

This study used qualitative, exploratory study design involving interviews of 25 key informants. The respondents had experience in conducting herbal medicine research. Two key informants were medical herbalists practising in hospitals piloting the integration in Ghana. We used Framework analysis to identify the perspectives of key informants in regards to the integration. 

Results

Key informants mostly support the integration although some noted that the government needs to support scale-up in other public hospitals. Among the strengths cited were the employment of medical herbalists, utilization of traditional knowledge, research opportunities, and efficient service delivery by restricting the prescription and use of fake herbal medicine. The weaknesses were the lack of government policies on implementing the integration, financial challenges because the National Health Insurance Scheme does not cover herbal medicine, poor advocacy and research opportunities, and lack of training of conventional health practitioners in herbal medicine.

Conclusions

Researchers view the integration of the two healthcare systems–biomedicine, and herbal medicine– positively but it has challenges that need to be addressed. The integration could offer more opportunities for researching into herbal medicine. More training for conventional health professionals in herbal medicine could increase the chances of better coordination between the two units. Additionally, strong advocacy and publicity is needed to educate more people on the integration and the utilization of the services.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (10.1186/s12906-018-2334-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Potential applications of engineered nanoparticles in medicine and biology: an update

Nanotechnology advancements have led to the development of its allied fields, such as nanoparticle synthesis and their applications in the field of biomedicine. Nanotechnology driven innovations have given a hope to the patients as well as physicians in solving the complex medical problems. Nanoparticles with a size ranging from 0.2 to 100 nm are associated with an increased surface to volume ratio. Moreover, the physico-chemical and biological properties of nanoparticles can be modified depending on the applications. Different nanoparticles have been documented with a wide range of applications in various fields of medicine and biology including cancer therapy, drug delivery, tissue engineering, regenerative medicine, biomolecules detection, and also as antimicrobial agents. However, the development of stable and effective nanoparticles requires a profound knowledge on both physico-chemical features of nanomaterials and their intended applications. Further, the health risks associated with the use of engineered nanoparticles needs a serious attention.

Biochemistry and biomedicine of quantum dots: from biodetection to bioimaging, drug discovery, diagnostics, and therapy

According to recent research, nanotechnology based on quantum dots (QDs) has been widely applied in the field of bioimaging, drug delivery, and drug analysis. Therefore, it has become one of the major forces driving basic and applied research. The application of nanotechnology in bioimaging has been of concern. Through in vitro labeling, it was found that luminescent QDs possess many properties such as narrow emission, broad UV excitation, bright fluorescence, and high photostability. The QDs also show great potential in whole-body imaging. The QDs can be combined with biomolecules, and hence, they can be used for targeted drug delivery and diagnosis. The characteristics of QDs make them useful for application in pharmacy and pharmacology. This review focuses on various applications of QDs, especially in imaging, drug delivery, pharmaceutical analysis, photothermal therapy, biochips, and targeted surgery. Finally, conclusions are made by providing some critical challenges and a perspective of how this field can be expected to develop in the future.

STATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE

Quantum dots (QDs) is an emerging field of interdisciplinary subject that involves physics, chemistry, materialogy, biology, medicine, and so on. In addition, nanotechnology based on QDs has been applied in depth in biochemistry and biomedicine. Some forward-looking fields emphatically reflected in some extremely vital areas that possess inspiring potential applicable prospects, such as immunoassay, DNA analysis, biological monitoring, drug discovery, in vitro labelling, in vivo imaging, and tumor target are closely connected to human life and health and has been the top and forefront in science and technology to date. Furthermore, this review has not only involved the traditional biochemical detection but also particularly emphasized its potential applications in life science and biomedicine.

A Review on the Electrochemically Self-organized Titania Nanotube Arrays: Synthesis, Modifications, and Biomedical Applications

Titania nanotubes grown by anodic oxidation have intrigued the material science community by its many unique and potential properties, and the synthesis of technology is merging to its mature stage. The present review will focus on TiO2 nanotubes grown by self-organized electrochemical anodization from Ti metal substrate, which critically highlights the synthesis of this type of self-organized titania nanotube layers and the means to influence the size, shape, the degree of order, and crystallized phases via adjusting the anodization parameters and the subsequent thermal annealing. The relationship between dimensions and properties of the anodic TiO2 nanotube arrays will be presented. The latest progress and significance of the research on formation mechanism of anodic TiO2 nanotubes are briefly discussed. Besides, we will show the most promising applications reported recently in biomedical directions and modifications carried out by doping, surface modification, and thermal annealing toward improving the properties of anodically formed TiO2 nanotubes. At last, some unsolved issues and possible future directions of this field are indicated.

A novel framework for biomedical entity sense induction

BACKGROUND

Rapid advancements in biomedical research have accelerated the number of relevant electronic documents published online, ranging from scholarly articles to news, blogs, and user-generated social media content. Nevertheless, the vast amount of this information is poorly organized, making it difficult to navigate. Emerging technologies such as ontologies and knowledge bases (KBs) could help organize and track the information associated with biomedical research developments. A major challenge in the automatic construction of ontologies and KBs is the identification of words with its respective sense(s) from a free-text corpus. Word-sense induction (WSI) is a task to automatically induce the different senses of a target word in the different contexts. In the last two decades, there have been several efforts on WSI. However, few methods are effective in biomedicine and life sciences.

METHODS

We developed a framework for biomedical entity sense induction using a mixture of natural language processing, supervised, and unsupervised learning methods with promising results. It is composed of three main steps: (1) a polysemy detection method to determine if a biomedical entity has many possible meanings; (2) a clustering quality index-based approach to predict the number of senses for the biomedical entity; and (3) a method to induce the concept(s) (i.e., senses) of the biomedical entity in a given context.

RESULTS

To evaluate our framework, we used the well-known MSH WSD polysemic dataset that contains 203 annotated ambiguous biomedical entities, where each entity is linked to 2-5 concepts. Our polysemy detection method obtained an F-measure of 98%. Second, our approach for predicting the number of senses achieved an F-measure of 93%. Finally, we induced the concepts of the biomedical entities based on a clustering algorithm and then extracted the keywords of reach cluster to represent the concept.

CONCLUSIONS

We have developed a framework for biomedical entity sense induction with promising results. Our study results can benefit a number of downstream applications, for example, help to resolve concept ambiguities when building Semantic Web KBs from biomedical text.

The mother's carnet de santé (health booklet) in Cameroon: a tool for preventing mother-to-child transmission of HIV?. Anthropol Med 2018;26:104-118. [PMID: 29482337 DOI: 10.1080/13648470.2017.1334039] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0]

In the global effort against HIV and AIDS, prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (PMTCT) in resource-poor countries is an issue of international importance. In Cameroon, a widely disseminated protocol defines the process to be followed by all pregnant women within the public health system before and after screening, whatever the result. The protocol as a representation of professional practices can be discerned in inscriptions made in files, registers and the carnet de santé that we use here as the cornerstone of our analysis. By granting it the status of a 'script' and intermediary object, we hypothesize that its purpose is to link together human and non-human actors around the PMTCT protocol in order to reduce the risk of mother-to-child transmission. However, as we show, representations and forms of interactions that are structured and reconfigured around it paradoxically contribute to the re-emergence of the risk of mother-to-child transmission of HIV.

A new path for humanistic medicine

According to recent approaches in the philosophy of medicine, biomedicine should be replaced or complemented by a humanistic medical model. Two humanistic approaches, narrative medicine and the phenomenology of medicine, have grown particularly popular in recent decades. This paper first suggests that these humanistic criticisms of biomedicine are insufficient. A central problem is that both approaches seem to offer a straw man definition of biomedicine. It then argues that the subsequent definition of humanism found in these approaches is problematically reduced to a compassionate or psychological understanding. My main claims are that humanism cannot be sought in the patient-physician relationship alone and that a broad definition of medicine should help to revisit humanism. With this end in view, I defend what I call an outcomes-oriented approach to humanistic medicine, where humanism is set upon the capacity for a health system to produce good health outcomes.

mORCA: ubiquitous access to life science web services

Background

Technical advances in mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets have produced an extraordinary increase in their use around the world and have become part of our daily lives. The possibility of carrying these devices in a pocket, particularly mobile phones, has enabled ubiquitous access to Internet resources. Furthermore, in the life sciences world there has been a vast proliferation of data types and services that finish as Web Services. This suggests the need for research into mobile clients to deal with life sciences applications for effective usage and exploitation.

Results

Analysing the current features in existing bioinformatics applications managing Web Services, we have devised, implemented, and deployed an easy-to-use web-based lightweight mobile client. This client is able to browse, select, compose parameters, invoke, and monitor the execution of Web Services stored in catalogues or central repositories. The client is also able to deal with huge amounts of data between external storage mounts. In addition, we also present a validation use case, which illustrates the usage of the application while executing, monitoring, and exploring the results of a registered workflow. The software its available in the Apple Store and Android Market and the source code is publicly available in Github.

Conclusions

Mobile devices are becoming increasingly important in the scientific world due to their strong potential impact on scientific applications.

Bioinformatics should not fall behind this trend. We present an original software client that deals with the intrinsic limitations of such devices and propose different guidelines to provide location-independent access to computational resources in bioinformatics and biomedicine. Its modular design makes it easily expandable with the inclusion of new repositories, tools, types of visualization, etc.

Electronic supplementary material

The online version of this article (10.1186/s12864-018-4439-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Common Aspects Influencing the Translocation of SERS to Biomedicine

This review overviews the impact in biomedicine of surface enhanced. Raman scattering motivated by the great potential we believe this technique has. We present the advantages and limitations of this technique relevant to bioanalysis in vitro and in vivo and how this technique goes beyond the state of the art of traditional analytical, labelling and healthcare diagnostic technologies.

Acceptance of a systematic review as a thesis: survey of biomedical doctoral programs in Europe

BACKGROUND

Systematic reviews (SRs) have been proposed as a type of research methodology that should be acceptable for a graduate research thesis. The aim of this study was to analyse whether PhD theses in European biomedical graduate programs can be partly or entirely based on SRs.

METHODS

In 2016, we surveyed individuals in charge of European PhD programs from 105 institutions. The survey asked about acceptance of SRs as the partial or entire basis for a PhD thesis, their attitude towards such a model for PhD theses, and their knowledge about SR methodology.

RESULTS

We received responses from 86 individuals running PhD programs in 68 institutions (institutional response rate of 65%). In 47% of the programs, SRs were an acceptable study design for a PhD thesis. However, only 20% of participants expressed a personal opinion that SRs meet the criteria for a PhD thesis. The most common reasons for not accepting SRs as the basis for PhD theses were that SRs are 'not a result of a PhD candidate's independent work, but more of a team effort' and that SRs 'do not produce enough new knowledge for a dissertation'. The majority of participants were not familiar with basic concepts related to SRs; questions about meta-analyses and the type of plots frequently used in SRs were correctly answered by only one third of the participants.

CONCLUSIONS

Raising awareness about the importance of SRs and their methodology could contribute to higher acceptance of SRs as a type of research that forms the basis of a PhD thesis.