Evidence needs, training demands, and opportunities for knowledge translation in social security and insurance...

To perform a European survey of the evidence needs and training demands of insurance medicine professionals related to professional tasks and evidence-based practice.

International survey.

Professionals working in insurance medicine.

Experts designed an online questionnaire including 26 questions related to 4 themes: evidence needs; training demands; evidence-seeking behaviour; and attitudes towards evidence-based medicine. Descriptive statistics were presented by country/conference and the total sample.

A total of 782 participants responded. Three-quarter of participants experienced evidence needs at least once a week, related to mental disorders (79%), musculoskeletal disorders (67%) and occupational health (65%). Guidelines (76%) and systematic reviews (60%) were the preferred types of evidence and were requested for assessment of work capacity (64%) and prognosis of return-to-work (51%). Evidence-based medicine was thought to facilitate decision-making in insurance medicine (95%). Fifty-two percent of participants felt comfortable finding, reading, interpreting, and applying evidence. Countries expressed similar needs for reviews on typical topics.

This study reveals evidence gaps in key areas of insurance medicine, supporting the need for further research, guidelines and training in evidence-based insurance medicine. Importantly, insurance medicine professionals should recognize that evidence-based practice is crucial in producing high-quality assessments.