Clinical Assessment Tools: The Berlin Assessment Tool

The Berlin Assessment Tool:


 * The Berlin assessment tool measures medical professionals' EBP competence (skills and knowledge).
 * It is made up of 15 multiple choice questions, which are primarily focused on assessing the participant's epidemiological skills and knowledge.
 * The EBP competencies of participants are compared to a 'control' group of medical professionals at the conclusion of the course.
 * The Berlin tool was able to reliably distinguish expertise between the two groups. Although the Berlin tool is described as a tool that can assess EBP competence, it only assesses one component of EBP ('Step 3' of the EBP process). It contains no assessment of the other three key steps needed to demonstrate complete competence in EBP.
 * Similarly, it has only been designed to assess EBP competence in medicine – it does not assess EBP competence across other health disciplines (e.g. nursing, allied health etc). Therefore, the Berlin tool can only at best truly assess one component of EBP competence.