Teaching evidence-based psychiatry: integrating and aligning the formal and hidden curricula.

OBJECTIVE

The authors argue that adopting evidence-based psychiatry will require a paradigm shift in the training of psychiatry residents, and offer some suggestions for how this transformation might be achieved.

METHODS

The authors review the growing literature that addresses how best to teach evidence-based medicine and highlight several examples of innovative instructional and assessment methods.

RESULTS

Little is known about how best to instill among residents the attitudes, knowledge, skills, and behaviors that are necessary to practice evidence-based psychiatry. However, there are indications that the integration of evidence-based medicine instruction into routine clinical care and the alignment of the "hidden curriculum" with evidence-based practice are important.

CONCLUSION

A whole-program approach may be necessary to create the conditions required in postgraduate training to produce evidence-based psychiatrists.