How to critically appraise a research paper

The ability to critically analyse surgical papers is an important skill that all surgeons should possess. This article describes a simple two-step approach to the appraisal of scientific literature. It relies on a rapid review based on the abstract followed by a detailed review based on simple checklists. These can be applied to systematic reviews, randomized trials and observational studies. At the end of the process, the quality of the methods, quality of the results and applicability of the work are evaluated to formulate an opinion on overall quality. The article ends with a suggested format for writing a report based on such an appraisal.