110 AUSTRALASIAN DENTIST COMPANY PROFILE The Dental Advice Network Dental Journal Club (DJC) is an important step forward in improving the information literacy of clinicians. This Australian-first initiative is based on educational research which shows that clinicians who are exposed to critical appraisal of scientific articles become far better at recognising the strengths and weaknesses of scientific publications. Journal clubs have been an important part of specialist training and research higher degrees, so that postgraduate students become proficient at analysing the literature on which their clinical work and research projects are based. This includes understanding the limitations of that literature and its underlying assumptions. Following the same approach, the DJC is an important way that clinicians can develop skills in information literacy, since the focus of the DJC is on interpretation and application of information, rather than on the design of a research project. As well as considering the published scientific literature, the DJC also addresses social media, helping clinicians to identify disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation on social media platforms, where opinions often masquerade as facts. In many cases, patients will present to the clinician information that they have found through simple internet searches, without recognising this may be fundamentally flawed or biased. In an age where information is readily available, clinicians must be able to navigate the growing mountains of information, for safe and effective clinical practice. The Dental Board of Australia expects that clinicians will base their clinical practice on the best available evidence, and this is laid out in the shared AHPRA Code of Conduct. However, few ANZ dental programs include formal training in critical appraisal of the literature as a core part of the curriculum for dentistry or oral health. Because of this gap, there is a need to upskill clinicians, so that they become informed consumers of the literature. The DJC has approached this challenge using a multifaceted approach based on the principles of adult learning. Firstly, there is formal education on the principles of the scientific method, followed by presentations on structured methods of analysis for various types of publications, ranging from experimental studies through to clinical research and systematic reviews. The DJC includes worked examples where the various strengths and weaknesses of particular papers are highlighted to illustrate the critical analysis approach. This includes landmark publications, and papers which have evoked controversy, from mainstream well-regarded journals, as well as from predatory journals where only lip service is paid to independent critical review. Subscribers to the Dental Advice Network will also have the opportunity to flag with the DJC convener particular papers, so that they can compare their own appraisal of the paper with that of an expert reviewer. Finally, the DAN journal club also explores the limitations of Ai using large language models, including its well-known tendency is to “hallucinate” and invent information as well as to create fictitious references to support such flawed information. The DJC will stimulate clinicians to think more deeply about the complexity of issues, including the various confounding elements or biases that may be operating. With a focus on the real-world application of evidence-based dentistry principles, the DJC will help clinicians determine the veracity (truth), reliability and applicability of journal publications that they read, and will give them the intellectual tools to filter through social media posts and undertake their own fact-checking. This will help clinicians become better at discerning between opinions and provable facts. Over the central doorway of the Forgan Smith Building at the University of Queensland is a quote that reads – “Great is truth and mighty above all things”. Its Latin equivalent is: Magna est veritas et praevalet, and for centuries this appeared on army shields as the acronym MVP. As the convener of the DAN Journal Club, it is my hope that the DJC will ensure that dental clinicians will also pick up their figurative intellectual shield, and fight the battle for truthfulness, accuracy, and authenticity, as a result of the experiences that they receive through the Journal Club. X The Dental Advice Network Dental Journal Club By Emeritus Professor Laurence J. Walsh AO Emeritus Professor Laurence J. Walsh
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