[How to read medical journals. From ad hoc perusal to proactive reading to keep abreast of newly emerging evidence].

Physicians cannot practice good quality health care without updating their knowledge; reading is a key component of the continuing medical education, so their reading habits have been frequently studied in the past years. The information needs of doctors usually arise during the consultation and they are commonly related to the therapeutic and diagnostic strategy. Seeking answers to these questions from primary sources, such as medical journals, is time consuming and often discouraging. The just-in-time approach should be integrated by a "proactive monitoring for newly emerging evidence". Creating such a proactive system is not an easy task: time management, triage, teamwork, take home messages and tools are the critical steps to a successful lifelong learning. The aim of this paper is to help doctors to understand the better management of clinical knowledge, and to explain how to keep up professionally with the medical literature.