JAMA evidence

U s i n g Ev i d e n c e t o I m p ro v e C a re POETRY AND MEDICINE

The Best Reconnecting

Way to Bring
Evidence-Based Stephen T. Harvey, MD

Medicine Into Your The surgeon knows you. From the same small town
the other side of Skullbone, Tennessee,
Practice! where nobody goes but to say theyve been.
He followed you through school. Says you were known
Users Guides as the bare-knuckle champnot hard to believe
to the Medical a hero, for the lack of them, with a tough chin
Literature
A Manual for and a hook that crippled the deputy.
Evidence-Based You did time for that. And look how time
Clinical Practice, has done you now, Southpaw, with your good
Third Edition
hand frozen in your lunch box, caked blood
Guyatt/Rennie/ and sawdust hiding your tattoos. You came
Meade/Cook
in still wearing your tool belt. What are the
Users Guides
to the Medical odds, Doc sayswhether hes talking about
the chance hed know you, if your hand will take,
Literature
or how he ever managed to get out
Essentials of
Evidence-Based himself, he doesnt say. As you drift off,
Clinical Practice, he tells you Everything will be OK
Third Edition a platitude youve never thought much of.
Guyatt/Rennie/
Meade/Cook

Care at the
Close of Life
Evidence and
Experience
McPhee/Winker/
Rabow/Pantilat/
Markowitz

The Rational
Clinical
Examination
Evidence-Based
Clinical Diagnosis
Simel/Rennie

mhprofessional.com/jamaevidence

Author Affiliation: Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee.

Corresponding Author: Stephen T. Harvey, MD (stephen.harvey@vanderbilt.edu).
The JAMA Network
Section Editor: Charlene Breedlove, Associate Editor.
Submissions: Poems may be submitted to jamapoems@jamanetwork.org.

jama.com (Reprinted) JAMA March 15, 2016 Volume 315, Number 11 1171

Copyright 2016 American Medical Association. All rights reserved.

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