Americans deserve a national health program that has the authority and resources to oversee the production of unbiased and credible evidence-based information, affirms the Institute of Medicine in a recent report.

Too often, there are variations in how health care providers treat the same conditions, reflecting confusion and uncertainty on which clinical practices should be followed, the report asserts.

To develop an effective assessment program, Congress should require the Department of Health and Human Services to designate a single entity with overarching responsibilities to set priorities for, fund and manage systematic reviews of clinical effectiveness, the report notes.

Evidence-based medicine is the practice of integrating individual physician expertise with the best available external clinical resources. EBM applies clinically-based best practices to improve outcomes and quality.

The health care market has become over-saturated with EBM and other health care product data, however, to the point where it's difficult for the field to tell which information is accurate and which is suspect, the report contends.

"We need a way to synthesize data about the effectiveness of health care products and services in standardized, objective fashion that will be considered reliable and trustworthy by all decision makers," says Barbara McNeil, IOM committee chair and head of the health care policy department at the Harvard School of Medicine. "A system coordinated by a single, national entity that can prioritize and coordinate these evaluations would enable us to … make sense of it all."

IOM, which is located in Washington, D.C., provides independent research to policymakers and health professionals.

America's Health Insurance Plans, which also proposed a single entity last year, supports IOM's report.

"Patients deserve to know not only what medical treatments work, but which treatments work best," says Karen Ignagni, president and CEO of AHIP, a Washington, D.C.- based group. "With new treatments and technologies introduced each day, providers need a dependable and trusted source of information that provides useful guidance on treatment options available," she adds.