This paper evaluates the concept of evidence-based practice (EBP) and appraises critically the implementation process of the EBP initiative, noting its consonance with the aspirations of the dominant political culture and offering a critique of the inherent contradictions and ethical dilemmas associated with it. A critical evaluation of the implications for practitioners and service users is offered and the authors argue that while the concept of EBP is a laudable one, there is a need to exercise caution about uncritical acceptance and evidence that a more eclectic and less reductionist approach to EBP is essential for quality service development.

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Abstract-Optical CDMA Local Area Networks allow shared access to a broadcast medium. Every node on the network is assigned an Optical Orthogonal Codeword (OOC) to transmit or receive on. OOCs are designed to be pseudo-orthogonal, i.e., the correlation (and therefore the interference) between pairs of codewords is constrained. This paper demonstrates that the use of optical CDMA does not preclude the need for a media access control (MAC) layer protocol to resolve contention for the shared media.OOCs have low spectral efficiency. As more codewords are transmitted simultaneously, the interference between codewords increases and the network throughput falls. This paper analyzes a network architecture where there is virtually no MAC layer, except for choice of the codeset, and shows that its throughput degrades and collapses under moderate to heavy load. We propose an alternate architecture called Interference Avoidance where nodes on the network use media access mechanisms to avoid causing interference on the line, thereby improving network throughput. Interference avoidance is analyzed and it is shown that it can provide up to 30% improvement in throughput with low delays and no throughput collapse. We validate our analysis through simulation with realistic network traffic traces.

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