title: Concordance between clinical practice and published evidence: findings from The National Dental Practice-Based Research Network.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Documenting the gap between what is occurring in clinical practice and what published research findings suggest should be happening is an important step toward improving care. The authors conducted a study to quantify the concordance between clinical practice and published evidence across preventive, diagnostic and treatment procedures among a sample of dentists in The National Dental Practice-Based Research Network ("the network").
  
  
  METHODS
  Network dentists completed one questionnaire about their demographic characteristics and another about how they treat patients across 12 scenarios/clinical practice behaviors. The authors coded responses to each scenario/clinical practice behavior as consistent ("1") or inconsistent ("0") with published evidence, summed the coded responses and divided the sum by the number of total responses to create an overall concordance score. The overall concordance score was calculated as the mean percentage of responses that were consistent with published evidence.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The authors limited analyses to participants in the United States (N = 591). The study results show a mean concordance at the practitioner level of 62 percent (SD = 18 percent); procedure-specific concordance ranged from 8 to 100 percent. Affiliation with a large group practice, being a female practitioner and having received a dental degree before 1990 were independently associated with high concordance (≥ 75 percent).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Dentists reported a medium-range concordance between practice and published evidence.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Efforts to bring research findings into routine practice are needed.
authors.affiliation: Dr. Norton is an assistant professor, Department of Health Behavior, School of Public Health, University of Alabama at Birmingham.
authors.forename: Wynne E
authors.initials: WE
authors.lastname: Norton
authors.forename: Ellen
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Funkhouser
authors.forename: Sonia K
authors.initials: SK
authors.lastname: Makhija
authors.forename: Valeria V
authors.initials: VV
authors.lastname: Gordan
authors.forename: James D
authors.initials: JD
authors.lastname: Bader
authors.forename: D Brad
authors.initials: DB
authors.lastname: Rindal
authors.forename: Daniel J
authors.initials: DJ
authors.lastname: Pihlstrom
authors.forename: Thomas J
authors.initials: TJ
authors.lastname: Hilton
authors.forename: Julie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Frantsve-Hawley
authors.forename: Gregg H
authors.initials: GH
authors.lastname: Gilbert
mesh_terms: D003625:Data Collection; D003731:Dental Caries / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000628:therapy; D003793:Dental Restoration, Permanent / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D055094:Evidence-Based Dentistry / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D019983:Guideline Adherence / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D008964:Molar, Third / Q000601:surgery; D019239:Practice Patterns, Dentists' / Q000592:standards* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014081:Tooth Extraction / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology
keywords: Clinical practice; dentistry; evidence-based dentistry; implementation science