I am sure some of the SHARP core faculty and team members have been asking themselves why we bother to do journal clubs. I would put money on a bet that some of you have even rolled your eyes at the concept with the thought “I already have so much else to do for my research career to blossom. This is such a time suck.” To be sure, reading the articles in advance and engaging for an hour in discussing the methods, content, and implications takes time. But, I would posit that it is a valuable use of time for several reasons:
- Read scientific literature. We have been forced into being skimmers and abstract readers. With the myriad constraints on our time we tend to live in the cliff notes version of scientific literature. Yet one of our key missions as health services researchers is to produce literature that will provide important knowledge to others and turn the dial in quality, costs, and outcomes for surgical care. Journal Clubs allow for us to read 2-3 full journal articles and contemplate their quality. This act in and of itself it edifying. It builds discipline and a number of key skills that are detailed in key points below.
- Build knowledge on HSR methods. These methods may be entirely new to us or a welcome review. Using this week’s journal club as an example, how many of you have ever done research using Medicare Prescription Drug Claims? Yet some of the most high impact work in medication use among the elderly in the past 4 years has come from this data source. The moment we think we are expert at something, whether as surgeons operating in the OR or as health services researchers, we have failed. There is always opportunity to grow one’s mind about HSR methods and we try to pick journal club articles that achieve that goal.
- Recognize and learn from bad research. No one wants to be known for their crappy research. Yet we all know people who have achieved that infamy. We don’t always pick the most perfectly executed HSR papers for journal clubs because it is worthwhile to dissect others’ research and make a judgment as to the quality be it pure methods critique, interpretation critique, or presentation critique. The ability to carefully assess the literature and determine whether the conclusions are meaningful based on a real evaluation of the methods is an essential skill for all researchers, practitioners, and policy-makers. We get an edge by practicing this at journal clubs, and we prevent ourselves from making the same mistakes.
- Consume literature outside of one’s specialty. The volume of journals that hit our real or virtual mailboxes is overwhelming. It’s hard to keep up and commonplace to simply focus on our clinical specialty. Journal clubs with articles curated by others provide the opportunity to examine HSR in other venues and find ways to replicate what impresses us (see #2) and avoid what seem poorly done (see #3). Also, given that all specialties’ patients might be touched by surgical disease, the content from other journals might provide us great targets for our own research. The impact factor of Annals of Internal Medicine is 19.4, why shouldn’t we try to publish there if we learn in today’s journal club that we have relevant work to share!
- Scientific kinship. You have all heard me talk about the SHARP family. You have also no doubt heard about cul de sac dwelling moms with book clubs. Our journal club is the SHARP friends and family version of the wine, cheese, and a good book to discuss with like minded people. It’s a way to get free of the other draining tasks of our work lives, a moment to reset together. We do it because “the book” will help us bloom in some way (see #1-4) and because it gives us a change gather without any real pressure. And yes, we aren’t naïve. Just like more than half the moms are there having not read the book, we hope that you will reap some the benefits of the face to face discussion even if you couldn’t put in the extra time in advance to read the “book.”
Thanks for continuing to show up and for giving these book clubs a chance. If you have suggestions sent them to Scott (Scott.Strassels@osumc.edu)