Translational research in medical education: What constitutes as evidence?

Introduction: Medical education (ME) seeks to improve medical students’ education as best as possible. This is because high-quality education leads to high-quality competence and thus to better healthcare quality. In order to produce these high-quality outcomes medical education has to be optimally evidence informed. Generally there is a delay in adopting evidence into practice, even in clinical disciplines. In medical education this translation from evidence for practice is further complicated by the fact that producers of ME research and clinical educators may speak different jargons and have different views on what constitutes convincing evidence.Objectives: This doctoral study aims to improve evidence-based educational practice in ME through the lens of implementation science and to further shed light on ME translational research processes. To achieve this, we need to first identify characteristics of transitional research constructs: what is the intervention/evidence, who are the stakeholders and where does the process take place. We are investigating these objectives: to what extent are ME researchers willing and able to change their concept of evidence to better suit the expectations of clinical educators. Discussion: Evidence, as one of the main components of translational research, needs to be well-defined. In ME, we communicate with clinicians who may have a particular view on what constitutes evidence, differing from the view in ME. In translational research, evidence is coloured by cultural and epistemological points. In this presentation, we will further discuss those points. We will also discuss what the nature of evidence is and what constitutes as evidence in ME.Questions for exploration: We would like to explorewhat role evidence plays in translational process and how the audience would use those concepts of evidence in research translational processes.