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clinical leadership), and the number of peers in the work group. Five items were used to measure factors relating to the participants’ perception of the use of research evidence in practice. The items were inspired by an instrument based on socio-cognitive theory intended to assess the impact of continuing professional education (CPE) activities [17]. Four of the items were scored on a scale of 1-7, with the end points defined as low [1] and high [7]. For one of the items, respondents were presented with a choice of five percentage intervals. The items could be used in any order and did not constitute a final score. The 18-item Implementation Climate Scale is a measure of the climate for EBP implementation [18]. The instrument captures six dimensions of the organizational context that indicate to employees the extent to which their organization prioritizes and values the successful implementation of EBPs: focus on EBP, educational support for EBP, recognition for EBP, rewards for EBP, selection for EBP, and selection for openness. Analyses of the instrument by the authors supported the reliability and construct-based evidence of validity for the Implementation Climate Scale, as well as the aggregation of the measure to the work group level. The instrument is scored on a scale of 0 (not at all) to 4 (to a very great extent). The total score ranges from 0 to 72 (0-12 per subscale). The 12-item Implementation Leadership Scale measures strategic leadership for implementation [19]. The instrument demonstrated excellent internal consistency and reliability as well as convergent and discriminant validity when tested by the authors [20]. The instrument has four subscales representing proactive leadership, knowledgeable leadership, supportive leadership, and perseverant leadership. The items are scored on a scale of 0 (not at all) to 4 (to a very great extent). Responses to the 12 items are summed, resulting in a total score ranging from 0 to 48. The 18-item EBP Implementation Scale was used to measure the extent to which EBP was implemented [21]. The instrument originated from a review of the literature on essential components Received survey n = 1168 Potential responders n = 934 (20%) lost for admin reasons n = 234 Non-responders n = 640 Responders n = (294-1 "outlier"=) 293 Figure 1: Flowchart describing the recruitment of participants to the study. Neher et al. J Rheum Dis Treat 2016, 2:039 ISSN: 2469-5726 • Page 3 of 8 • Data analysis Mann-Whitney and chi-square tests were used to compare groups of responders and non-responders to assess non-response bias. Information was gathered by telephone and e-mail with regard to gender, age, and level of education. Descriptive statistics were used for demographic factors, and to report the distribution of scores on the measures. Multiple regression analyses determined the contribution of the different variables on the study outcome, i.e., the score on the EBP Implementation Scale. Groups were formed to build a model for predicting the outcome. Multiple logistic regression analysis was carried out to investigate the variables associated with EBP implementation. The dependent variable, the level of EBP implementation, was dichotomized based on the mean of the total score, resulting in low EBP implementation (score of 0-12 on the EBP Implementation Scale) and high EBP implementation (score of 13 and over). The independent variables were age, profession, postgraduate education, experience in profession, experience in clinical rheumatology, experience of research activities, number of professional peers in work group, assessment of personal ability to use research evidence (in terms of self-efficacy), perceived value of research evidence for clinical practice,
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