The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (http://www.dhhs.gov/) contains 11 different agencies, including the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).  Its mission is “To improve the quality, safety, efficiency, and effectiveness of health care for all Americans.” 

AHRQ’s web site is filled with excellent resources for a range of audiences. Some of my favorite picks include:

-Effective Health Care Program (http://effectivehealthcare.ahrq.gov/index.cfm). This section of the AHRQ web site contains information for consumers about a range of health conditions and procedures.  I reviewed the summary guide about treating prostate cancer, and found it full of helpful and easy to understand information.  Many of the summary guides are available as audio files, too.  There is also a useful glossary of medical and statistical terms.

-Technology Assessments (http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/techix.htm) and Evidence-Based Practice reports (http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/epc/epcseries.htm).  These documents represent massive literature reviews, and they often contain tables with detailed descriptions of related literature.  It’s worth browsing through the lists of reports to see if there are any available on topics of interest to you. 

The AHRQ’s web site is rich and deep.  These are just a few of my favorite spots–please feel free to let me know if there other areas that I might like to explore.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 10th, 2009 at 5:16 pm and is filed under Caralyn's Picks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.