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DHYG 2201: Supporting Evidence-Based Practice / Literature Review

This guide was created for Murphy's DHYG 2201 class; Fall 2025.

What is a Literature Review?

The literature review provides your audience with relevant information about your topic, as well as your synthesis and evaluation of the article. It is not just a summary of the article. It is not possible to provide all of the information on a topic with three or five articles. As you locate articles, determine those that are the most relevant and that give you the most information.

Choose a minimum of three articles. Before you begin, locate other literature reviews in your discipline.

There are several steps in writing a literature review:

  1. Choose a research area. For this assignment, you may choose any current topic in dental hygiene.
  2. Identify sources of information. This literature review will be limited to peer-reviewed research articles from journals only. Articles must have been published during the last five years. A list of search tools is provided under the "Find Research" tab.
  3. Record citation information for your report and bibliography as you research. See the "Citation Help" tab for more information.
  4. Locate, read, and evaluate potential articles. Take notes on your articles, and identify patterns as well as agreements or disagreements among the authors. The guides listed below contain excellent questions to consider as you read and evaluate each article.
  5. Write your review, including your own synthesis and evaluation of the articles you selected. Provide a citation and a summary for each article.

Evidence Based Resource Model, Levels of evidence Literature reviews are important sources of information in evidence-based practice. The example article provided is also an example of a specific type of literature review - the systematic review. Systematic reviews are valuable in evidence-based practice because they:

  • are designed with a clear set of stated objectives
  • are comprehensive for a well-defined area of study
  • evaluate and synthesize the quality and findings of the studies included.

Most search tools provide a search filter to make it easy to locate systematic reviews on your topic. This is a useful filter that can provide you with high quality information very quickly. To learn more about how systematic reviews are developed, see "How to conduct a systematic or evidence-based literature review."

You are not required to conduct a systematic review for this assignment; however, you might want to consider including a systematic review as part of your literature review, if you can find one that fits the criteria and search requirements of your assignment.

Locating literature reviews, in general, and systematic reviews, in particular, is both a time-saver and a method of finding critical evaluations of research.

Image credit: Claude Moore Health Sciences Library. (2003). Evidence Based Resource Models. Retrieved February 13, 2019 from https://www.slideshare.net/anandmscn/evidence-based-practice-strategies-to-nursing-practiv [Slide 26].

What is Evidence Based Practice (EBP)?

Evidence-based practice is an important concept in all healthcare fields. It's commonly referred to as EBP for short (or EBM: evidence-based medicine), but can also be adapted for the field in which it is used; example: evidence-based dentistry (EBD).

Below is a video about EBD.

Dental hygiene falls under the umbrella of evidence-based dentistry (EBD). This evidence is found in peer-reviewed resources (also known as peer-refereed resources). The American Dental Association defines EBD as "an approach to oral health care that requires the judicious integration of systematic assessments of clinically relevant scientific evidence, relating to the patient's oral and medical condition and history, with the dentist's clinical expertise and the patient's treatment needs and preferences." 1

Evidence Based Dentistry, Courtesy of Delta Dental
3

There are five steps in the Stetler model of evidence-based practice 2:

  1. Asking a Well-Defined, Focused Question
  2. Finding the Evidence
  3. Critical Appraisal of the Evidence
  4. Making a Decision
  5. Evaluating Performance

This guide will focus on the first two steps in this process to help you complete a brief literature review of a current clinical topic in dental hygiene. Galveston College has created a guide on the Stetler model (and others) HERE!

1 American Dental Association. (2013, August 29). "Policy on Evidence-Based Dentistry."

2 CEBM: Centre for Evidence Based Medicine. (n.d.). "Tools: EBM tools for the five stages of Evidence-Based Medicine." Retrieved from https://www.cebm.net/category/ebm-resources/tools/

3 Delta Dental of Iowa. (n.d.). "Evidence based dentistry." Retrieved from https://www.deltadentalia.com/webres/Image/dentist/evidence-based-dentistry.png

Subjects: Health Occupations
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