1. Starting a journal club what to think about
Feb. 2016

2. At a journal club, you… ...read a clinical or research article…
...discuss it...
...and how it applies to your practice...
...and whether you should change your practice
Here are some things you should think about if you want to run a journal club.

3. Aims and objectives What is the club’s purpose?
What do you hope each meeting will achieve?
Whose support do you need?
Attendance at a journal club might improve your critical reading skills; help you become more confident at giving presentations; encourage evidence based practice; improve your familiarity with research. A journal club can help with your CPD (and revalidation), and may change your practice!
Having support of key people could mean people are encouraged to attend and make it easier to make arrangements.
You may want to have written aims and objectives and give them to participants, so all attendees know what to expect and what to do.

4. Who to invite Nurses? Doctors? Allied health professionals?
Students on placement?
All professions?
From where - your ward, department, sub-specialty, specialty?
How many people?
A journal club could be an opportunity for interprofessional education and working. You could invite everyone in your MDT.
How many is too many? This could be a limit set by the size of the room, but the size of the group might influence how much discussion you get.

5. When, where, how often? Morning, afternoon, evening? Weekly, monthly?
How long will meetings be?
Where will you meet?
Here are some practical things to think about.
If people can’t attend, or have to miss a meeting, can you do anything to share the discussions with them? Could you record the session, send round notes or circulate any presentation?
Meeting in the department/ward might be best, but if you have nowhere to go, the Library has meeting spaces.
Virtual journal clubs, using webinar software or Twitter, are also a possibility. The Library has some examples of these.

6. How will the meeting work?
Basic idea: read a paper, discuss it and how it applies to (or changes) your practice.
Will everyone read the paper at the meeting, and discuss?
Or will someone prepare a presentation about the paper?
Find out what other clubs do
The Library has examples of structures
You could hand out the paper at the meeting, and let people read it, then discuss.
Or someone could prepare a presentation about the paper, give the presentation and invite questions, then have a discussion. Other people could have the paper in advance, or on the day.
The Library can put you in touch with existing journal clubs at UHL, and also has some examples from elsewhere.

7. Who runs the club? Facilitator Will you have a leader?
How will you choose the leader?
A facilitator could be the person who books rooms, choose topics, issues invitations, and makes other arrangements.
You may decide to have a leader for each meeting. That could be the facilitator, but you could have a different leader each time. The facilitator could draw up a rota (which might be difficult, if people’s shift patterns and workloads are unknown) or you agree at one club meeting who will lead the next.
Leading a journal club meeting is a good opportunity to practice your presentation and appraisal skills. So, you might decide to give as many people as possible a turn at leading. If your journal club is multidisciplinary, having a different leader each time is a way to make sure that one profession does not dominate.

8. What to discuss Which article? How to choose it? Who chooses?
An article that someone has encountered? Or do you find one specifically for the club meeting on a known topic (the Library can help you with this).
Who chooses? The presenter? The facilitator? Or do you invite ideas from the meeting for the next one?
Instead of choosing a specific article, you could have a clinical question and spend some of the club time finding articles. You would need to allow enough time for this. You could spend time one meeting doing this to find something to discuss at the next meeting.

9. Preparation Do attendees need to do anything in advance?
Will you send the article out in advance?
How long before the meeting?
How? Who sends it?
Or will you give the paper out at the meeting?
How will you get copies to send?
Does everyone need to read the article before the meeting? Or just the presenter?
The Library can help you get enough copies and can advise on the technicalities of this.

10. Critical appraisal How will you appraise the article?
Which appraisal tool will you use?
Does the leader do the critical appraisal and present their findings? Or does everyone do it in advance, or at the meeting?
How will the appraisal be done? CASP might be the first choice of tool, but there are other critical appraisal tools available and the Library can advise.

11. Could anyone else come? For a particular meeting:
A statistician?
Someone with research methods skills and knowledge?
Someone with a particular interest in the topic?
Your Clinical Librarian?
If your Clinical Librarian is there, they can advise on resources that address the topic, find other articles on that same topic, and it would be easy to give them requests for information on other topics and ask them questions, while you have them in front of you!

12. Incentives Coffee? Biscuits? Lunch? Accreditation
Could you arrange coffee? Or biscuits? Or invite volunteers to bring home baking?
Or allow people to eat their lunch during the club (this may depend on the venue!).
Lunch may be a step too far, unless people bring their own… or you have a sponsor.
Can you get RCN or similar accreditation, or internal accreditation, for attendance, so people can get points?
Either way, attendees can record attendance in CPD records, and their NMC revalidation portfolio (the Library can talk to you about how journal clubs, and library workshops, relate to revalidation and which parts of the NMC Code they relate to).

13. The Library can help Help you find which article to appraise;
Advise you on getting copies;
Advise on critical appraisal tools to use;
Help you acquire critical appraisal skills;
Offer you a meeting space;
Put you in touch with existing journal clubs
Tell you about practice elsewhere.
Critical appraisal skills – we can run a workshop for you, or you can book a place on our regular workshop
Meeting space – we think you would be better meeting in your own area, but if you have nowhere, we have rooms
We know of existing journal clubs that are happy to share their experience, and give you more detailed information. And we know of experience elsewhere
(for example:
Sheffield Children’s Hospital;
LondonLinks

14. Contact us ClinicalLibrarian@uhl-tr.nhs.uk Ext. 2307 / 2309 / 5558
Please do contact us if we can help. We would be happy to meet with you, or attend your journal club.