Introduction to the Journal of Evidence Based Medicine

Treatment of triple-negative breast cancer with Chinese herbal medicine: A prospective cohort study protocol.

Five years ago, we launched the Journal of Evidence Based Medicine shortly after the devastating earthquake in Wenchuan county, part of Sichuan province where the Chinese Cochrane Centre is based (1). We write this editorial after another large earthquake has struck the province, this time in Lusang. Future issues of the Journal will include articles reflecting on how the evidence and experience from five years ago was used to support the response this time. The progress that has been made with Evidence Aid since 2008 also ensured that bundles of potentially relevant Cochrane Reviews were available immediately, (2, 3) and the 2012 Annual Report for Evidence Aid has just been published (www.EvidenceAid.org) (4). In keeping with our earlier articles that discuss global topics that might have a particular relevance to evidence from China, Juncai Xu and colleagues from Shanghai discuss the Europe Union’s Traditional Herbal Medicinal Products Directive. They highlight the need to continue to improve the quality of the evidence for Traditional Chinese Medicine, to provide the reliable and robust research that people need to make well informed decisions and choices. To help overcome the challenges of getting research evidence into practice, Pierre Squara from CERIC in France introduces the idea of the “systematic loop” to describe a process for medical decision making. We also have a series of articles about medical education itself, discussing the role of academic health system in preparing future healthcare practitioners with the skills and desires to make best use of evidence, including one from Lincoln Chen, President of the China Medical Board. While, in our own Education section, we explore the reporting of systematic reviews. This issue also include reports of new studies that might themselves help to resolve uncertainty. For instance, a singlecenter, non-randomized comparative study of 62 patients examining the effects of surgery on quality of life and survival for patients with spinal metastases from hepatocellular carcinoma, leads to a recommendation against surgical treatment for such patients. And, a systematic review of 21 studies of adoptive transfusion of tolerogenic dendritic cells in mice provides ideas for future studies which might help with future transplantation studies in humans. In our first issue of 2013, we introduced the BRICS Medicines Alliance, which is seeking to improve medicines access and wise use in Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (5). This month, Jing Sun the Chinese Coordinator of the Alliance provides a commentary on two systematic reviews of policies to promote the use of generics and the implications to China.

Introduction to the Journal of Evidence Based Medicine

Citations

Treatment of triple-negative breast cancer with Chinese herbal medicine: A prospective cohort study protocol.

Editorial for issue 2 of 2013, Journal of Evidence Based Medicine.