InfoGuides: Dental Hygiene / Dental Assisting Research Guide: Using PICO and the Evidence Pyramid

PICO

PICO is an acronym used in evidence-based practice to frame and answer a clinical question.

PICO is useful in academic and clinical settings. It can help you:

form a question that focuses on the most important issue for a patient or a population
identify key terms to use when searching for evidence
select results that directly relate to the situation

PICO Breakdown

Patient

What are their most important characteristics?

Primary problem
Disease state
Co-existing condition

Describe your patient specifically:

Sex
Age
Ethnicity
Socioeconomic factors

ALWAYS include this piece in your search.

Intervention

What do you want to do for the patient?

Order a test
Prescribe a drug
Order a procedure

Other considerations:

Main intervention
Prognostic factors
Exposures

Almost always include this piece in your search.

Comparison

What is the alternate intervention, if any?

A different drug
No medication
A Placebo
A different test
A different procedure

It is less common to include this piece in a search.

Outcome

What are you hoping to achieve, measure, or change for the patient?

Alleviate symptoms
Improve test results
Reduce adverse events
Improve function

Could also be the result NOT desired.
Sometimes include this piece in your search.

Example Questions

1. Do electric toothbrushes (intervention) work better than manual toothbrushes (comparison) to remove plaque (outcome) when used by children (population)?

2. Should young adults with asymptomatic impacted wisdom teeth (patient) have them removed (intervention)?

3. In children with dental caries (patient), will fluoride varnish (intervention), as compared to no fluoride varnish (comparison), result in a decreased incidence of caries (outcome)?

Searching with PICO

What kind of sources do I need?

Additional Help