Transforming Hospital Care: Impact of an Evidence‐Based Practice Course on Healthcare Professionals' Competencies in a Randomized Clinical Trial

INTRODUCTION: Evidence-Based Practice (EBP) is essential to healthcare quality and safety, integrating scientific evidence with clinical expertise and patient preferences. Despite its importance, EBP implementation still faces major challenges. Educational interventions have proven effective in strengthening EBP competencies among healthcare. MAIN: To evaluate the impact of a personalized educational intervention on EBP competencies among healthcare professionals. Working at a private tertiary general hospital, comparing performance before and after the intervention. METHODS: A randomized controlled trial involving healthcare professionals was conducted. Eligible and consented participants were randomly assigned to either an Intervention Group (IG) receiving an Evidence-Based Practice (EBP) course or a Control Group (CG) not receiving the course, stratified by job level, role, and work shift. From the completers, 18 participants were randomly selected for the IG, and all 7 available CG participants were included in the final sample for analysis. All study participants completed two validated instruments: the Assessing Competencies in Evidence-Based Medicine (ACE) and the Fresno Test. The educational intervention consisted of a seven-week course with weekly three-hour sessions, for a total of 21 h. Comparative analyses were conducted using a Linear Mixed Model, adjusted for educational level, job level, time working at the hospital, and weekly workload. RESULTS: A statistically significant increase in general EBP knowledge was observed in the IG following the intervention, with a mean gain of 19.1%. Separate analysis showed improvements of 10.8% in ACE and 24.2% in Fresno Test scores. No statistically significant changes were observed in the CG. Furthermore, after the intervention, the IG outperformed the CG for both general EBP knowledge and Fresno Test scores on both pre- and post-intervention comparisons. CONCLUSION: The educational intervention had a positive statistically significant impact on EBP knowledge and skills among healthcare professionals in the IG compared to the CG. These findings underscore the potential of structured educational initiatives to enhance the quality of clinical practice through improved EBP competencies. TRIAL REGISTRATION: UTN U1111-1322-8443.