Professor Khalid Khan’s research has a strong patient led theme and lay involvement has been a feature of most of his research projects. He actively involves consumers in the strategic planning of his research projects.

People and public bring perspective of their own experiences of conditions being researched, of supporting patients seeking advice, of providing information and seeking consent, and of dissemination which has befitted research implementation work greatly. Virtually all of his projects has lay representation on the management and steering groups. Lay colleagues have made significant contributions particularly in defining questions and outcomes, writing lay summary for research applications, designing patient information sheets and data collection forms, engaging members of their organisations with recruitment and dissemination. Lay contributors appear as co-applicants, collaborators and co-authors in Professor Khan’s research.

The effectiveness of interventions geared at educating health care personnel in the principles of evidence-based medicine for the provision of quality health care has been demonstrated by Professor Khalid Khan. On objective assessments, his face-to-face critical appraisal courses improved EBM attitudes and knowledge.

His projects allowed the dissemination of evidence-based medicine teaching in the Birmingham region in the UK, with over 788 trainees and consultants trained across 12 specialties. Opportunities to develop e-learning strategies for EBM were developed with the EU-EBM Unity grant from the European Union Leonardo da Vinci programme to produce and promote a unified curriculum for evidence-based medicine across European partners: University Hospital Basel, Switzerland; Agency for Quality in Medicine, Berlin, Germany; Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza, Italy; Arcana Centre, rakow, Poland; University of Szeged, Hungary; Academic Medical Centre, Amsterdam, Netherlands; Ramon y Cajal, Madrid, and Hospital Donostia, San Sebastian, Spain; and University of Birmingham Medical School, UK. It led to 13 peer-reviewed publications and its e-learning curricula have been used to train over 659 trainees.

Professor Khalid Khan’s publications in this area have been highly accessed and cited, paving the way for a truly international e-EBM curriculum that is rigorously developed and tested for effectiveness. Teaching evidence-based medicine (ebm) and critical literature appraisal skills have been a key aspect of Professor Khalid Khan’s engagement with clinical colleagues. When he first established ward rounds and journal clubs involving clinical librarians in Birmingham UK, these were recognised by the Commission for Health Improvement review team as ‘notable practice’.