EVIDENCE-BASED EMERGENCY MEDICINE WORKING GROUP

MINUTES 8/3/99

Present: Jim Celentano, Peter Dayan, Barney Eskin, Phil Hubel, Ilene Wilets and Ben Yeh.

The meeting was called to order at 1910 by the acting chairman, Barney Eskin. The meeting was held via teleconference.

OLD BUSINESS

Minutes of the July meeting were reviewed and approved.

OCTOBER WORKSHOP

Fifteen participants have signed up and checks have been received from 13. For the 2 missing checks, Phil Hubel is following
up with Rao and Ben Yeh with Sturmann. For the 16th and final slot, Peter Dayan contacted three applicants in the last few
days; one declined and Peter is awaiting replies from the other two.

Course materials were discussed. Barney Eskin will review materials from the previous NYAM and recent McMaster courses and
will cull the best of these to be sent out as a package for the workshop. Jim Celentano, who attended the McMaster workshop
this year in an internal medicine group, stated that most internal medicine modules would not be appropriate for us, with the
possible exception of the module on a metaanalysis of thrombolytic therapy for stroke.

We will need to include an acknowledgment of Pfizer's support with the course materials given to the Emergency Medicine
participants.

TEACHING AGENDA FOR THE COMING YEAR

Ben Yeh will be presenting the topic of the Journal Club Bank at the combined meeting on September 7th. We discussed other
topics that we could present at the next combined meeting, December 7th. Phil Hubel volunteered to discuss the new users'
guide on differential diagnosis. Although we do not know whether the general group has other topics they wish to discuss,
Barney Eskin will submit this offer to Roseanne Leipzig.

FUNDRAISING UPDATE

The grant from Pfizer has been approved and the check is expected soon (Dayan).

JOURNAL CLUB BANK

Ben Yeh reported that 60 people have signed on to the Journal Club Bank thus far, and he is receiving about 3 inquiries about it
per day. However, only a few actual entries have been submitted. All programs that have signed on have selected the option to
share their Journal Club Bank entries with other programs. Ben has corrected some technical problems with the site. He plans
to send a description of the Journal Club Bank to area program directors so that they will be more familiar with this resource.

Barney Eskin passed on an inquiry from the Mayo Clinic via the evidence-based-health mailing list from England regarding CATs
available on different web sites. Ilene Wilets will correspond with the author to share information about CATs on the web with
him.

BIG CATS

Peter Dayan discussed work within the SAEM interest group to develop protocols for on-line CATs. Discussion ensued about
the possibility that the reviewer would actually have to spend more time doing his review than the original author did writing the
CAT. Phil Hubel thought that with the amount of effort being put into the CATs, they would be of quality sufficient for print
publication. Barney Eskin reiterated his suggestion that for any given CAT, two authors independently compose the CAT and
submit the two versions to an editorial board for adjudication and final publication.

Peter Dayan, as the work group leader for this area within the SAEM Interest Group, will proceed with efforts to develop a
preliminary consensus with the work group and will keep us informed of progress. In the meantime, people with thoughts and
ideas on this should be in touch directly with Peter, as should SAEM members with interest in working on this project.

SPRING BROOKLYN EBM COURSE

Jim Celentano will contact Ted Gaeta about arranging the one day EBM course for 3 residencies in Brooklyn in the spring. Ilene
Wilets and Peter Dayan volunteered to assist with the course. It will likely be patterned after the SAEM course that Steve
Hayden arranged in Boston this year. For the tutorial groups for that course, one tutor was required for about 8-10 participants.

NEW BUSINESS

NEW USERS' GUIDES

Phil Hubel will post the references for the 5 most recent users' guides on the evidence-based emergency medicine mailing list.

POSTING LECTURES ON THE WEB SITE

It was decided to pursue posting lectures on the web site. Ben Yeh stated that the technology to do this is readily available. It
was felt that the lectures can stand independently, and do not require additional explanation. However, a suggestion was made
that, with the authors' permission, an email address be included so that readers can contact the authors should they require
explanation of any of the slides. We agreed that the lectures should be posted as written and in whatever format they are
written. An example of a lecture already posted (Roseanne Leipzig's introductory lecture on EBM posted on the NYAM web site)
was
given.

TELECONFERENCING

The format of tonight's meeting was discussed. Participants found this favorable since it is convenient, although it will not
replace the monthly face-to-face meetings normally held. The majority felt that the cost of the teleconference (about $80-90)
should be paid for from group funds. Ben Yeh stated that there are internet alternatives to teleconferencing, such as chat rooms.
These have the advantage that they do not cost anything.

The next monthly meeting will be held at the NY Academy of Medicine, 1215 Fifth Avenue (at 103rd St.) at 5:15 PM on September
7th. Food will be available. The meeting will be followed by a meeting with the general EBM group; Ben Yeh will present the
topic of the journal club bank.

Having no further business, the meeting was adjourned at 1950.

Respectfully submitted

Barney Eskin