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Network Grants

Our Network Grants 2015 programme was open to EBVM Network members and invited original projects that contribute to strengthening the evidence-base in the veterinary sciences and making that evidence available to those in practice.

Details of the projects chosen are as follows:


Developing Equine VetCompass




Title:
Developing Equine VetCompass
Duration: 28 months
Objectives: This project will be led by Dr Kristien Verheyen of the Royal Veterinary College, and aims to form an extensive list of diagnostic terms relevant to equine practice that will be incorporated into VetCompass, to allow standardised recording of disease and diagnoses. Electronic patient records will be extracted from participating practices for 18 months, and data will then be analysed to estimate frequency of, and determine risk factors for, the most common diseases/conditions seen. This will aid the diagnostic process for vets and help horse owners to manage their horses in order to minimise the risk of disease.


Building a business case for EBVM




Title
: Building a business case for EBVM
Duration: 12 months
Objectives: This project will be led by Dr Elizabeth Jackson of the Royal Veterinary College, and aims to expand the adoption of EBVM amongst UK veterinary practices by identifying its improvement to practice performance. This project is made up of two stages; firstly, interviews will be conducted with participating practices that have begun implementing EBVM concerning client satisfaction and cost reduction. These factors will then be tested for statistical significance in an online survey looking at a range of practice types. This will produce an evidence-based business case for EBVM that can be clearly communicated to stakeholders.

Investigate the teaching/learning processes of initiating an EBVM culture in a large, private, first-opinion veterinary company


Title
: Investigate the teaching/learning processes of initiating an EBVM culture in a large, private, first-opinion veterinary company
Duration: 18 months
Objectives: This project will be led by Dr Ava Firth of Vets-Now. We will be funding an educationalist investigation of how people learn the multitude of skills required to practice EBVM, as well as the obstacles often encountered and which solutions are useful.  The learning experiences of the participants will be documented in a way that can be translated and reported externally, as they work through the discovery and application of EBVM in a multi-site, first-opinion small animal practice. The teaching will be through webinars, online discussion forums, assignments, in-person working-group meetings and pursuit of a small clinical research project. A bi-product of this project will be two Knowledge Summaries.