Cochrane News

Subscribe to Cochrane News feed
Updated: 2 hours 8 min ago

Featured Review: Impact of public release of performance data on the behaviour of healthcare consumers and providers

Thu, 09/06/2018 - 11:13

Cochrane Effective Practice and Organisation of Care  wanted to find out if publicly releasing information about the performance of healthcare providers (e.g. hospitals and individual professionals) has a measurable influence on changing the behaviour of consumers, providers, and purchasers of care. The authors also sought to determine whether this affected the performance of healthcare providers, patient outcomes, and staff morale.

 The recently published review found:
  • The available evidence suggests that publishing performance data does not make very much difference to where patients choose to go for treatment. It also appears to make little difference to the behaviour of healthcare providers, i.e. professionals and organisations.
  • There has been little high-quality research in this area and so it is difficult to have a high degree of certainty about the actual impact of publishing data about the performance of healthcare providers. Normal 0 false false false EN-GB JA AR-SA /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;}
  • Public release of performance data may improve patient outcomes in some cases. There is however evidence to suggest that this could increase inequality as some patient groups are more likely to act on this information than others.

 “Public release of performance data is becoming increasingly commonplace and is usually assumed to be 'a good thing." says  David Metcalfe, Lead Author. "However, there is a risk of such interventions causing harm, e.g. by misleading patients, encouraging providers to “game” the system or avoid treating high-risk patients, distorting clinical priorities, and/or increasing healthcare inequalities. It is therefore important that we pause to evaluate and understand the effects of such initiatives.

There is room within the “research space” for high quality research aimed at understanding how and when public release of performance data can effect positive change for patients. Future research should aim to examine the impact of public release of performance data on patient outcomes rather than simply healthcare processes.”

The authors searched the literature for studies evaluating the effects of publicly releasing healthcare performance information, and found 12 relevant studies that analysed data from more than 7570 providers, and a further 3,333,386 clinical encounters, e.g. individual patients.

Thursday, September 6, 2018

Cochrane Infectious Diseases seeks part-time Clinical Research Associate in Evidence Synthesis - Liverpool, UK

Wed, 09/05/2018 - 16:19
Contract type: Part-time, Fixed-term appointment at 0.6 FTE for up to 2 years Closing date: 24 September 2018

Founded in 1898 and the oldest of its kind in the world, the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) is an internationally recognised centre of excellence for teaching and research in tropical diseases. LSTM’s Centre for Evidence Synthesis in Global Health has led developments in systematic reviews in tropical medicine and international health. In the 1990s, staff contributed to setting up Cochrane, and established the Cochrane Infectious Diseases Group (CIDG). This is now recognised as one of Cochrane’s premier groups, with over 150 Cochrane reviews and 600 authors, and is well-linked with the World Health Organization and we are looking to expand the centre.

 As part of this, we are recruiting staff for the six year “Research, Evidence and Development Initiative” (READ-It) programme.  We are in the inception phase and planning a variety of new and exciting reviews with our colleagues, partners, and stakeholders.  You will be part of this process and be part of review teams in the existing and new review portfolio.  Our priorities are developing rapidly and we are seeking to engage the successful applicant in a high-priority area commensurate with their areas of interest. For example, some topics we are mapping out are:

  • Insecticide-residual spraying for malaria control
  • HIV prevention
  • Health of refugees and people living in camps

There are also a variety of methodological projects related to Cochrane review updating, conflicts of interest, statistical reporting, and methods for moving from evidence to policy, and we aim for a mixed portfolio to provide abroad exposure to evidence-informed science.

The successful candidate will have an MBBS and an appropriate postgraduate qualification. Possessing a relevant PhD is desirable. You will have experience and confidence in critically appraising medical literature at postgraduate level. You must demonstrate evidence of a critical insight into priority policy questions in international health in infectious diseases relevant to low- and middle-income countries and have excellent skills in writing in plain English.

You will demonstrate experience of working in a multi-disciplinary team with the ability to work collaboratively as well as independently. We want people who have an enthusiastic approach to work and possess excellent attention to detail. You will be responsible for ensuring that effective communication flows within the project team and will need effective communication, time management, and organisational skills. If you have authored a Cochrane review, have experience of using GRADE, or have a track record in published research, it will be an added advantage to your application.

Wednesday, September 5, 2018 Category: Jobs

Cochrane Ireland seeks Senior Research Associate - Programme Manager - Galway, Ireland

Thu, 08/30/2018 - 15:53

Senior Research Associate - Programme Manager

Centre for Health Evaluation Methodology Research & Evidence Synthesis (CHEM-RES)

School of Nursing & Midwifery, NUI Galway.

Applications are invited from suitably qualified candidates for a 3-year fixed term contract position as Programme Manager (Senior Research Associate) for an evidence synthesis capacity building initiative funded by the Health Research Board (HRB) and the Health and Social Care, Research and Development (HSC R&D) Division of the Public Health Agency in Northern Ireland.

On of the principal duties  will be developing a world-class evidence synthesis capacity building centre at NUI Galway, including the re-establishment of Cochrane Ireland.

Thursday, August 30, 2018 Category: Jobs

Cochrane’s Editor in Chief responds to BMJ EBM article criticizing HPV review

Wed, 08/29/2018 - 14:13

Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language:EN-US; mso-fareast-language:EN-US;}

Normal 0 false false false EN-GB JA X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Source Sans Pro Semibold",sans-serif; mso-ascii-font-family:"Source Sans Pro Semibold"; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:"Source Sans Pro Semibold"; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-ansi-language:EN-GB; mso-fareast-language:EN-US;} On 27th July 2018, an article was published in the journal BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine relating to the recently published Cochrane Review on prophylactic human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccines. The article is based on analyses undertaken at the Nordic Cochrane Centre, and two of the authors are experienced Cochrane researchers: Professors Peter Gøtzsche and Tom Jefferson. It made several criticisms of the Cochrane Review, most notable of which was that the Cochrane Review was incomplete due to missing "nearly half of the eligible trials".

Cochrane takes all criticisms and feedback seriously, seeing this as one mechanism among many to improve the quality of Cochrane Reviews. The organization has 10 long-standing principles that we hold dear, and they include a commitment to quality and the minimization of bias, transparency, and a recognition of the need for our work to be relevant to the needs of evidence users and decision makers. Cochrane aims to create the best current evidence to guide health decisions.

We initiated an investigation in response to the criticisms, working with the review authors and editors and with independent researchers who had not been involved in the original publication. The key findings of our investigation are that:

  • The Cochrane Review did not miss "nearly half of the eligible trials". A small number of studies were missed due to the primary focus on peer-reviewed reports in scientific journals, but addition of these data makes little or no difference to the results of the review for the main outcome;
  • The trials comparators were unambiguously, transparently, and accurately described;
  • The selection of outcomes for benefits was appropriate and was consistent with World Health Organization guidance;
  • The review included published and unpublished data on serious harms, and the findings on mortality were reported transparently and responsibly;
  • The review was compliant with Cochrane’s current conflict of interest policy;
  • Cochrane’s media coverage was cautious and balanced, but we recognize that there could be improvements in relation to transparency where external experts are quoted;
  • The BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine article substantially overstated its criticisms.

 Read the full response

David Tovey, Editor in Chief, Cochrane
Karla Soares-Weiser, Deputy Editor in Chief, Cochrane

Monday, September 3, 2018

The Recommended Dose podcast: Cochrane co-founder Iain Chalmers

Mon, 08/27/2018 - 14:26

A very special conversation with a maverick British medico who set up a tiny research centre in Oxford and watched it grow into a global collaboration of over 40,000 people across 130 countries. Three decades on, Cochrane  now produces the world's most trusted health evidence that is used by patients, health professionals, researchers and policy makers around the world every day.

Cochrane co-founder Iain Chalmers joins host Dr. Ray Moynihan to look back on the origins of the organisation and the extraordinary life of its namesake, Archie Cochrane. Iain also reflects on his work beyond the collaboration - from working in refugee camps in Gaza to teaching children in Uganda how to detect ‘bullshit’ health claims and more recently, establishing the James Lind Alliance. It's no surprise he's received the BMJ’s most prestigious award for a lifetime of achievement in healthcare, along with a knighthood from the Queen.

Listen to this episode on SoundCloud, iTunes, Stitcher  or wherever you listen to your favourite podcasts. 

Find more details and our show notes the podcast page or follow on twitter  or facebook.

The Recommended Dose is produced by Cochrane Australia and co-published with The BMJ.

Monday, August 27, 2018

Testing Treatments book now available for free in 15 languages

Mon, 08/20/2018 - 16:47

Normal 0 false false false EN-CA X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman",serif;}

The book Testing Treatments has been recently translated into Danish, making it available now in a total of 15 languages with more coming soon.

Testing Treatments was written to address a fundamental healthcare question: ‘How do we ensure that research into medical treatments best meets the needs of patients?’  Because research often fails to answer this question, and because many treatments are not based on sound evidence, the authors set out to promote better and more critical public evaluation of the effects of medical treatments.

Testing Treatments is widely used as a learning and teaching aid. The book is for anyone who wants to understand better how treatments can be tested fairly, why it is important to do this, and how anyone interested in health and health care can play a part in the process of testing treatments.

You can access the book in all 15 languages for free on the Cochrane Training website

Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Edinburgh Colloquium schedule sign-up and app are now launched

Mon, 08/20/2018 - 15:09
Sign-up for the Colloquium schedule

Sign-up is now available for the full Colloquium schedule. Login to your Colloquium account, and sign-up for the sessions you want to attend.

Workshops

Please note that most workshops have limited capacity, therefore participants are required to sign up for workshops. You can only sign up for one workshop per time slot, but you can be on the waiting list of a preferred workshop while signed up for another one. You will then receive an email when a spot is available.

Restricted meetings

Meetings are open to all delegates unless marked 'Restricted' to a specific target audience.

Social events
  • Register and donate today for the Anne Anderson Fundraising Walk – a city tour on Edinburgh, set-up to raise money for the Anne Anderson Prize.
  • Sign-up for the Ceilidh dance class – and if you like you can show off your new dance skills at the Gala Dinner.
 
Download the Colloquium app

You can now download the Colloquium app for Apple and Android devices. Search ‘Cochrane Colloquium 2018’ in the app stores.
 
Attendees can log into the app using their Colloquium account details to access and edit their sign-up options. Any changes made in the app sign-up will automatically sync with attendee’s website accounts and vice versa*.

Within the app, attendees will be able to:
  • Edit sign-up options for the Colloquium schedule**
  • Edit their app settings
  • View the full schedule
  • View speaker and sponsor profiles
  • Check floor plans
  • and other useful information

*It won't automatically update any exported calendar items.
**Please note: for iOS users, 'My schedule' can't be managed through the app. You will be redirected to your browser.

To find out more about the app, click here.

Monday, August 20, 2018

Cochrane Infectious Diseases Group seeks Clinical Research Associate in Evidence Synthesis - Liverpool, UK

Wed, 08/15/2018 - 17:50
Salary: Starting salary of £32,478 per annumContract type: Full-time, fixed-term for up to 2 yearsClosing date: 11 September 2018

Founded in 1898 and the oldest of its kind in the world, the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) is an internationally recognised centre of excellence for teaching and research in tropical diseases. LSTM’s Centre for Evidence Synthesis in Global Health has led developments in systematic reviews in tropical medicine and international health. In the 1990s, staff contributed to setting up Cochrane, and established the Cochrane Infectious Diseases Group (CIDG). This is now recognised as one of Cochrane’s premier groups, with over 150 Cochrane reviews and 600 authors, and is well-linked with the World Health Organization and we are looking to expand the centre.

 As part of this, we are recruiting staff for the six year “Research, Evidence and Development Initiative” (READ-It) programme.  We are in the inception phase and planning a variety of new and exciting reviews with our colleagues, partners, and stakeholders.  You will be part of this process and be part of review teams in the existing and new review portfolio.  Our priorities are developing rapidly and we are seeking to engage the successful applicant in a high-priority area commensurate with their areas of interest. For example, some topics we are mapping out are:

  • Insecticide-residual spraying for malaria control
  • HIV prevention
  • Health of refugees and people living in camps

There are also a variety of methodological projects related to Cochrane review updating, conflicts of interest, statistical reporting, and methods for moving from evidence to policy, and we aim for a mixed portfolio to provide abroad exposure to evidence-informed science.

The successful candidate will have an MBBS and an appropriate postgraduate qualification. Possessing a relevant PhD is desirable. You will have experience and confidence in critically appraising medical literature at postgraduate level. You must demonstrate evidence of a critical insight into priority policy questions in international health in infectious diseases relevant to low- and middle-income countries and have excellent skills in writing in plain English.

You will demonstrate experience of working in a multi-disciplinary team with the ability to work collaboratively as well as independently. We want people who have an enthusiastic approach to work and possess excellent attention to detail. You will be responsible for ensuring that effective communication flows within the project team and will need effective communication, time management, and organisational skills. If you have authored a Cochrane review, have experience of using GRADE, or have a track record in published research, it will be an added advantage to your application.

Wednesday, August 15, 2018 Category: Jobs

Cochrane Infectious Diseases Group seeks Research Assistant in Evidence Synthesis - Liverpool, UK

Wed, 08/15/2018 - 17:17
Salary: Starting salary of £28,098 per annumContract type: Full-time, fixed-term for up to 2 yearsClosing date:11 September 2018 

Founded in 1898 and the oldest of its kind in the world, the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM) is an internationally recognised centre of excellence for teaching and research in tropical diseases. 

LSTM'S Centre for Evidence Synthesis in Global Health has led developments in systematic reviews in tropical medicine and international health. In the 1990s, staff contributed to setting up Cochrane and established the Cochrane Infectious Diseases Group (CIDG). This is now recognised as one of Cochrane's premier groups, with over 150 Cochrane reviews and 600 authors, and is well-linked with the World Health Organization and we are looking to expand the centre.

As part of this, we are recruiting staff for the six year "Research, Evidence and Development Initiative" (READ-It) programme.  We are in the inception phase and planning a variety of new and exciting reviews with our colleagues, partners, and stakeholders.  You will be part of this process and be part of review teams in the existing and new review portfolio.  Our priorities are developing rapidly and we are seeking to engage the successful applicant in a high-priority area commensurate with their areas of interest. For example, some topics we are mapping out are:

  • Insecticide-residual spraying for malaria control
  • HIV prevention
  • Health of refugees and people living in camps

There are also a variety of methodological projects related to Cochrane review updating, conflicts of interest, statistical reporting, and methods for moving from evidence to policy, and we aim for a mixed portfolio to provide abroad exposure to evidence informed science.

The ideal candidate will have a Masters in epidemiology, public health,clinical tropical medicine, or vector biology. You will have experience in biomedical or social science research in low-and middle-income countries and have confidence in critically appraising medical literature at postgraduate level.

You need to have completed a substantive quantitative analysis, either a systematic review or an applied research project.  You need clear evidence of critical insight into priority policy questions in international health relevant to infectious diseases.

Demonstrating initiative, commitment, organisational skills, and the ability to meet deadlines is essential; as is a flexible approach to work withthe ability to work independently or as part of a diverse team.

If you have authored a Cochrane review, have experience of using GRADE, or have a track record in published research, it will be an added advantage to your application.

Wednesday, August 15, 2018 Category: Jobs

The Recommended Dose podcast: Alexandra Barratt on using both medicine and the media to explore and promote the critical role of evidence in healthcare

Thu, 08/09/2018 - 17:15

Episode 12 -Alexandra Barratt
'It's not science or instinct...it's evidence and personal preferences. That's really, to me, the heart of shared decision making.’


This week’s guest has led something of a double life, using both medicine and the media to explore and promote the critical role of evidence in healthcare. Now based at the University of Sydney, Alexandra Barratt's journey from clinician to journalist to global advocate for evidence based medicine and shared decision-making is a fascinating one.

Here she talks with acclaimed journalist and health researcher ,Dr Ray Moynihan, about her varied career and the reasons she's ended up challenging conventional wisdom. She also talks about her research into the pros and cons of breast cancer screening and questions the widely-accepted idea that early detection is always the best medicine.

Listen to this episode on SoundCloud, iTunes, Stitcher  or wherever you listen to your favourite podcasts. 

Find more details and our show notes the podcast page or follow on twitter  or facebook.

The Recommended Dose is produced by Cochrane Australia and co-published with The BMJ.

Thursday, August 9, 2018

Comic highlights Cochrane and World Health Organization collaboration for positive birth experience guideline

Wed, 08/08/2018 - 20:07

Swiss illustrator explains his motivation for creating the comic and what he hopes it shows.

The World Health Organization (WHO) has issued new recommendations to establish global care standards for healthy pregnant women and reduce unnecessary medical interventions. The new WHO guideline includes evidence from 17 Cochrane Reviews and has 56 evidence-based recommendations on what care is needed throughout labour and immediately after for the woman and her baby.

Swiss illustrator, Martin Vuillème from The Science of Cookies (an online French-English comic about the health and social sciences, research, and news) created a comic about the many steps involved in updating the WHO guidelines on the childbirth experience. Here he explains his motivation for creating the comic and what he hopes it illustrates:

“Pregnant women all over the world are keen to make the best decisions for their children and for the future of their families. This may lead them to hear various advice and suggestions from doctors, nurses, midwives, friends and relatives, or even from people they meet on the streets. But where do reliable recommendations come from?  What are they based on? And why should we trust them?

In this illustration I wanted to point out the tremendous work of WHO and the extreme care that was put into formulating trustworthy health recommendations. From the selection of a diversity of unbiased guideline authors, the prioritization of the most important questions and outcomes for pregnant women (such as a “positive childbirth experience”), the search of the most reliable evidence (often coming from Cochrane, an important partner of the WHO) up to the formulation of the final recommendations and their dissemination I hope to have captured the essence of key steps involved in the creation of helpful, informative and reliable international recommendations.

While I may have decided to summarize the guideline making process to a couple pages, care should be taken not to forget that the WHO recommendations and Cochrane review that inspired the creation of this illustration are the culminations of years of efforts invested by dozens of international experts (among which the critically important pregnant women representatives!)...But most importantly, they are the fruit of respectful discussions informed by values and based on research involving thousands of pregnant women, who often volunteered their time and sometimes even risked their lives in the process with no direct rewards. The WHO and Cochrane authors couldn’t have done their work without them.

The care, consideration towards pregnant women and rigor that were shown in the making of those recommendations are the reasons why I put my trust in Cochrane and the WHO...And the reasons why I plan to continue doing so in the future.”

The comic is currently being working on and the input from those involved is welcomed. We will update this page as it progresses.

Thursday, August 9, 2018

Work begins to establish a new Cochrane Network across China

Wed, 08/08/2018 - 19:45

Cochrane is pleased to announce plans to establish a new, open and collaborative Network within China.

A group of interested stakeholders have been invited to a two-day strategic planning meeting to be held on 9-10 October in Beijing (hosted by the Peking University Health Science Center), to discuss the strategic direction and the establishment of a Cochrane China Network. 

The Cochrane China Network primary functions will be around ensuring that Cochrane’s evidence is increasingly used in policy and practice inside China; supporting the Cochrane community of volunteers (authors, methodologists, editors) in China; and promoting and representing Cochrane in the country.

This initiative involves the current Cochrane China Centre in Chengdu, as well as the new leadership of the Cochrane Hong Kong Affiliate. It is expected that a formal launch of Cochrane’s China Network will take place in early 2019.

For more information of Cochrane’s China Network, and sharing suggestions and information that promote Cochrane’s work across China, please contact Sylvia de Haan, Senior Advisor (Centres, Partnerships and Fundraising), Cochrane.

Additional resources:

Wednesday, August 15, 2018

Cochrane Library Special Collections on malnutrition

Thu, 08/02/2018 - 21:16

Free access to all included Cochrane Reviews

Acute malnutrition threatened the lives of 50.5 million children under five years globally (7.5%) in 2017. About 16 million children with acute malnutrition are estimated to have severe acute malnutrition, the most extreme and visible form of undernutrition. 

Two new Cochrane Library Special Collections, which started as part of a joint initiative with Cochrane Nutrition and  Evidence Aid, bring together Cochrane Reviews addressing the prevention of moderate acute malnutrition and severe acute malnutrition and the treatment of acute malnutrition. Access to all Cochrane Reviews included in both Special Collections are free.

Tuesday, August 14, 2018

Editor in Chief discusses the journey to the new Cochrane Library

Thu, 08/02/2018 - 20:31

Editor in Chief of the Cochrane Library, David Tovey, describes the journey of updating the Cochrane Library, which spans being a journal and a knowledge resource, and includes current and archive content, multi-lingual text, and a varied collection of databases.

It all began in April 2012 at Cochrane’s business meeting in Paris: a ‘strategic session’ aimed at agreeing a content strategy for Cochrane and our primary output, the Cochrane Library. My team had prepared well: there was broad approval for moves towards greater diversity in content, and more flexibility in its presentation and delivery to end users (readers). If that moment represents conception, it has been an awfully long gestation.

Readers less familiar with Cochrane may be uncertain about what constitutes the Cochrane Library. Is it a journal? Is it a knowledge database? Therein lies some of the complexity. The Library is a collection of knowledge databases. One of these, the best known and most used, is the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (CDSR). This contains some 7600 systematic reviews, published over the past 25 years, many of which have been updated several times. The CDSR is also a hybrid journal containing some open access content and some available via subscription, which is largely organised on a national, regional or institutional basis. It has monthly issues, an impact factor, and is heavily accessed and cited. The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL) is a concentrated collection of (predominantly) randomised controlled trials, curated from a variety of sources. It is an essential part of the search for all high quality systematic reviews, whether produced inside Cochrane or not.

The recommendations that emerged from the Paris meeting formed the basis for goals 1 and 2 of the subsequent Strategy to 2020: to produce high quality, relevant reviews that inform health care decision making and to ensure that those reviews are accessed and used. The work to deliver on these goals can be tracked forward to our current Transformation Programme, which has brought together our 52 Cochrane Review Groups into 8 thematic Networks, and the development of our Content and Knowledge Translation strategies. These all reflect an awareness that our content needs to meet increasingly diverse and sophisticated decision maker needs and reflect emerging methods and data sources. We also need to find different ways to communicate review findings, based on a range of different user types (‘personas’ in tech development-speak), and including more diversity in language, presentation (or ‘packaging’) and delivery.

Fast forward from Paris to the café at the Novotel, Hyderabad in September 2014. Around a table in the late afternoon during the Cochrane Colloquium, Todd Toler and Deborah Pentesco-Murphy on behalf of our publishers, John Wiley and Sons laid out their proposals. In essence, after many frustrations, we all recognised that the Wiley Online Library platform, which had hosted the Cochrane Library for many years, was not able to accommodate Cochrane’s plans, without undermining its ability to host all Wiley’s other journals. We agreed that the solution was for Cochrane to be hosted separately, at Wiley’s expense, on a new platform, which would be identified through an RFP (Request for Proposals) process. The discussion energised us all, and it was not difficult to get clearance from our Governing Board to proceed. We had a plan.

A few months later, the venue is a Business School residential centre near London. The largest interview team I have ever experienced – seemingly about 20 people in the room, with more on the phone. Two of us from Cochrane. Four candidate teams over two days. Two clear leaders, and an eventual winner: a software company called Semantico, based in Brighton.

The development was meant to take 12 months. Six or seven months in, we were already behind schedule, when in a blink of an eye Semantico ceased to exist; acquired by Highwire a platform technology company based in Stanford USA with encouraging experience of having hosted major international journals. It may seem churlish now to point out that one of the influences in our choice of development partner was the personal commitment from Semantico’s founder and owner to stay the course. As it turned out not only did Semantico cease to exist but so did its entire Senior Management Team – submerged below the surface without so much as a ripple. The Semantico project manager, then and now viewed widely on all sides as one of the many unstinting heroes of the project, provides the only visible continuity, apart from the developers.

As time went on it became increasingly clear that our deadlines were not being met. The tri-partite development approach originally agreed by Cochrane, Wiley and Highwire was severely tested – we always knew that it was the greatest risk to the project. We got further and further behind schedule despite everyone’s best efforts, which were considerable. Our Governing Board looked over our shoulder, expressed its concern, but permitted us to proceed.

Most of us have had to familiarise ourselves with a new language and new processes. This is a world where ‘waterfall’ is an alternative to ‘agile’. Everyone seemingly agrees that ‘agile’ is the preferred method – leading to show and tell sessions we can attend following every two week ‘sprint’ where we can see the progress that is being made and provide feedback. There are ‘scrum teams’, ‘stand ups’ (brief functional meetings where comedy is not usually a feature), ‘tickets’ and some new acronyms: UX (user experience), UAT (user assessment testing), SMEs (subject matter experts). We talk of ‘SOS’ when we mean ‘Scrum of Scrums’, we document almost every breath in ‘Confluence’, and every task in ‘Jira’. None of the Cochrane editorial team has used these before but by the end of the project several of the team members could choose either as their specialist subject on a quiz show. We talk about ‘Epics’, by which we don’t mean ‘Gone with the Wind’, ‘stories’ (ditto) and ‘features’ (still ditto). You can complete a feature or story without signing off an epic. Or perhaps it is the other way around. Somewhere back in the distant past lies our comfort zone.

After all these tribulations, we have finally reached the first summit. Cochrane has a brand new Cochrane Library. It looks superficially similar to its predecessor so as not to alarm our frequent users, but with some important enhancements.  Our multi-lingual content is easier to find and better presented. This is important. In the past three years we have seen a tripling of the number of people accessing the summaries on Cochrane.org, our own website. This has been almost entirely driven by the increases in use in Francophone and Spanish speaking countries. It is true that if you provide content that is easy to find and in people’s own languages, they will come. The new Cochrane Library incorporates more links between related pieces of content, internally and between the Library and external sites. This includes more links between the bibliographic records in CENTRAL and the reviews in CDSR, and more links from reviews to relevant guidelines. The Cochrane Library now includes content aimed at practising health professionals – Cochrane Clinical Answers - and a federated search of the Epistemonikos platform to identify non-Cochrane systematic reviews. There are other features and functionality available now, including some aimed at ensuring that the Cochrane Library meets the needs of, and links with other developments in the scientific publishing landscape such as Crossref, ORCID, Altmetric, Read Cube and others. Most importantly, there is the promise of many more to follow, including the potential to search by PICO parameters (Population, Intervention, Comparators, Outcomes), and the ability to publish different content types, such as methodological articles, rapid reviews and more varied forms of systematic review, and to package them in different ways customised around the needs of evidence users.

There is no denying that the journey has been harder than we all imagined in 2012. Perhaps that is the underlying message. There is a reason why project management language is now dominated by its technology influences. Nothing is simple when you are building a product that spans being a journal and a knowledge resource, includes current and archive content, multi-lingual text, and a varied collection of databases. If you are planning such a large technology project, my advice is to take 10 deep breaths and ask yourself: do you know everything you need to know? Are you sufficiently clear on your requirements and have you communicated them effectively? What will the implementation effort be, and how much will this distract you from everything else you want to achieve? Study it as hard and in as much detail as you can, and then consider whether to add a nought on to every calculation.

Nonetheless, across the three organisations, committed, skilled groups of people have worked tirelessly to deliver the new Cochrane Library. I am extraordinarily proud of the contributions all of our teams have made, whilst recognising the costs, the sacrifices and pain that the project has incurred. Throughout a long and arduous process, the relationships within and across our organisations have remained positive, cordial and collegiate. We are all pleased with what we have delivered and excited about the next steps. Please visit the Cochrane Library, and send me your feedback. We hope that it will become the ‘home of evidence’ that our ‘Strategy to 2020’ envisaged.

David Tovey
Editor in Chief
Cochrane Library

Thursday, August 2, 2018

Cochrane seeks Medical Terminology Manager - flexible location

Thu, 08/02/2018 - 15:55

Specifications: Part Time (0.6 FTE) 12 Months Fixed Term Contract
Salary: Competitive
Location: Flexible
Application Closing Date: 31/08/2018

This role is an exciting opportunity to use your experience as a Medical Terminology Manager to make a difference in the field of health care research. 

As part of the Cochrane Linked Data team you will have a lead role in developing and maintaining the Cochrane Vocabulary, which includes managing and implementing policies regarding purpose, scope, requirements, concept models, hierarchies and terms for the Cochrane Vocabulary.

You will manage and deliver the quality validation process used in the maintenance of the Cochrane PICO Vocabulary and Ontology.

You will quality check the PICO (Population, Intervention, Comparator, Outcome) meta-data for biomedical research information, coded using controlled vocabularies and terminology sets, including SNOMED CT, RxNorm, MedDRA and WHO ATC. Research information includes systematic reviews, clinical trial reports and randomised control trials.

We are looking for a self-motivated and highly organised individual who is able to work effectively and collaboratively with a diverse range of contacts across the world.  The successful candidate will also have:

  • Significant theoretical and practical experience in information science, medical informatics, or closely-related discipline
  • Minimum 3 years experience with the practical application of clinical coding systems (SNOMED CT, RxNorm, MedDRA, WHO ATC)  to a diverse range of content
  • Experience with evidence-based medicine, systematic reviews, trial design, and methodologies
  • Demonstrated experience with taxonomies, thesauri, ontologies, and other hierarchical schema
  • Experience with the maintenance and governance of metadata and the processes around curation, versioning, and management of controlled terminology sets
  • Broad topic experience across all health domains
  • Experience or knowledge of techniques of information retrieval and understanding of users’ needs - search, browse, faceted browse, user interfaces, and federated querying.
  • Strong communication skills (both written and verbal), good collaboration skills, and the ability to work effectively across teams and organizations in a global (mostly virtual) work environment.
  • Results-oriented and the ability to deliver on a schedule
  • Strong analytical and judgment skills including ability to make decisions and manage risk.
  • Attention to detail

Cochrane is a global, independent network of health practitioners, researchers, patient advocates and others, responding to the challenge of making vast amounts of research evidence useful for informing decisions about health. We do this by synthesizing research findings to produce the best available evidence on what can work, what might harm and where more research is needed. Our work is recognised as the international gold standard for high quality, trusted information. An understanding of Cochrane’s work and health research more generally is an advantage, but not essential.

If you would like to apply for this position, please send a CV along with a supporting statement, including salary expectations, to recruitment@cochrane.org with Medical Terminology Manager in the subject line.  The supporting statement should indicate why you are applying for the post, and how far you meet the requirements for the role outlined in the job description using specific examples.  Please list your experience, achievements, knowledge, personal qualities, and skills which you feel are relevant to the post.

For further information, please download the full job description.

Deadline for applications: 31st August 2018 (12 midnight GMT)

Interviews to be held on: (TBC)

Thursday, August 2, 2018 Category: Jobs

Cochrane is seeking a Senior Editor for the Children and Families Network - Flexible location

Wed, 08/01/2018 - 19:08

Specifications: Maximum of 0.2 FTE
Salary: Competitive
Location: Flexible
Contract: 2 years
Application Closing Date: 15 August 2018

Context
In 2017 Cochrane created eight new Networks of Cochrane Review Groups (CRGs) responsible for the efficient and timely production of high quality systematic reviews that address the research questions that are most important to decision makers. The creation of these thematic Networks provided an exciting opportunity for experts in the field to join Cochrane’s new editorial leadership and help the organization deliver its Strategy to 2020 objectives.

Cochrane is now seeking a high-performing Senior Editor to lead the Cochrane Children and Families Network.

Accountability and Responsibility
The Senior Editor is accountable to Cochrane’s Editor in Chief. Upon her/his appointment, the Senior Editor will join the Editorial Board for the Cochrane Library. The Editorial Board will be responsible for supporting the EiC and overseeing development and implementation of editorial strategy, in particular the review production process for Cochrane Reviews, and also monitoring the performance of the Cochrane Library. 

Within her/his Network, working with CRG teams and the Associate Editor, the Senior Editor’s main responsibilities are both strategic and operational:

  • Ensure that the reviews produced and published by the CRGs within the Network are of high quality and meet Cochrane’s standards.
  • Identify gaps in scope coverage based on (at a minimum) the global burden of diseases, and lead and support prioritization processes within the Network.
  • Lead and support the identification of shared priorities within the Network.
  • Support communication between the Network and Cochrane community.
  • Support innovation in the production of Cochrane systematic reviews and their end use.

Each Senior Editor will be responsible for one Network.

Person specification
The Senior Editor will possess the seniority and experience that enables her/him to fulfil their roles, preferably with the expertise relevant to an organization such as Cochrane, operating as a not-for-profit charity in the research and publishing sectors.

The Senior Editor should also have experience and expertise in key areas of systematic review production, and in addition should be able to demonstrate:

  • Sensitivity, openness and awareness of non-verbal communication;
  • Critical thinking, creativity and strategic awareness;
  • An ability to identify potential problems and deal with risk;
  • Cross-cultural sensitivity and an awareness of issues of equity.

Essential attributes:

  • Leadership and strategy skills and experience
  • Skills and knowledge in basic and advanced systematic review methods
  • Recent experience of conducting and leading high-quality systematic reviews (Cochrane Reviews desirable)
  • Advanced communication, influencing, and negotiation skills
  • Advanced problem solving and time management skills
  • Strong commitment to Cochrane’s Strategy to 2020, and the importance of high quality, relevant systematic reviews that impact on health care and policy
  • Ability to support and lead innovation
  • Ability to commit to being available for one day per week for a three-year period

Desirable attributes:

  • Relevant content expertise
  • Past or present experience of being a Co-ordinating Editor of a high performing CRG
  • Past or present experience of editing systematic reviews

Resources
The Senior Editor will receive funding from Cochrane to support their work – scaled at about one day per week of activity.

Senior Editors will be able to draw on support from the Associate Editor allocated to their Network, and from a Methods Support Team. Cochrane’s Central Executive Team (CET) will also seek internal and external opportunities for attracting resources for additional support to the Network.

Term of appointment
The Senior Editor will be appointed in September 2018. They will serve as members of Cochrane’s Editorial Board for a period of three years, renewable.

Co-ordinating Editors who wish to apply for a Senior Editor’s position within a Network that consists of their CRG, should be prepared to step down from that role for the duration of their appointment.

Recruitment process
This position is open to anyone who meets the requirements described above.

All applications will be reviewed by the Editor in Chief and the Deputy Editor in Chief, who will jointly make the appointment.

We are open to job share applications that describe how the functions will be divided, and how continuity will be achieved. We would also welcome applications from candidates wishing to undertake this role as a part-time secondment from their employer.

The appointment process will consider the need for all aspects of diversity, including those of gender, age, experience, language and geographical location. Cochrane’s Editor in Chief aims to appoint a balanced Editorial Board that includes Senior Editors who possess a wide range of content and methodological expertise.

To apply please send a letter, Curriculum Vitae, and letter of support to recruitment@cochrane.org by 15 August 2018.

For further information, please download the full job description.

Deadline for applications: (12 midnight GMT)

Interviews to be held on: (TBC)

About Cochrane
Cochrane is a global independent network of researchers, professionals, patients, carers, and people interested in health.
Cochrane produces reviews which study all of the best available evidence generated through research and make it easier to inform decisions about health. Cochrane is a not-for-profit organization with collaborators from more than 130 countries working together to produce credible, accessible health information that is free from commercial sponsorship and other conflicts of interest. Our work is recognized as representing an international gold standard for high-quality, trusted information.

Wednesday, August 1, 2018 Category: Jobs

Addressing the gap in knowledge on chronic pain in childhood

Wed, 08/01/2018 - 11:51

Cochrane Pain, Palliative and Supportive Care  (PaPaS)  group addresses the gap in knowledge on chronic  pain in childhood and helps push solutions forward.

On July 12th at the Wellcome Trust in London, UK,  world-leading experts came together to look at evidence, policy and practice in the area of childhood pain.

Clinicians, researchers, funders and policy makers from charities, universities and hospitals discussed the lack of knowledge in this area and shared their collective ambition to increase the quality of evidence in this field.

Professor Christopher Eccleston, Coordinating Editor of the Cochrane Pain, Palliative and Supportive (PaPaS)  Review Group, who initiated the event explained, “Four years ago the Cochrane PaPaS Group promised a programme of systematic reviews on the evidence for interventions for adults with chronic pain (both neuropathic and cancer related) and children with chronic pain. The work was supported by the NIHR. We produced 49 systematic reviews in a three year period, 10 of which for children and adolescents with chronic pain. The principal finding from these ten reviews was a distinct lack of evidence,  with too few trials in this area. The lack of research in this important field is so striking that we wanted to gather a group of influencers together fast  to address this gap in knowledge and think creatively about what the solutions could be.”

Presentations were shared on pain in babies, pharmalogical treatments in chronic pain, pharmalogical treatments for disease related pain and psychological treatments for chronic pain followed by discussions which highlighted the lack of large, high quality trials in this area.

 Group discussions reflected;

  • clinical concerns about how pain is identified and measured in children and how adult measures don’t work for children
  • how cost effectiveness is used as evidence for decision-making in the absence of other knowledge
  • the lack of interest in researching old drugs
  • personalised medicine and how this effects creation of systematic reviews
  • the suitability of longitudinal studies for this age group (but the challenge of including them in systematic reviews.) 
  • how social media feeds a desire for immediate solutions and responses, but smart phones offer an opportunity to collect data differently 

The initiative led by the Cochrane PaPaS Group was funded by NIHR and backed by partners including the European Pain Federation, Wellcome Trust, and Arthritis Research UK. 

Co-organiser Systematic reviewer and editorial assistant Dr Emma Fisher from the PaPaS Group, explained, “All the attendees are working in some way to mitigate the lack of data in this field, for some it is a daily challenge - treating young patients, knowing they can’t help them as much as they would like. This is a springboard and just the beginning. As an academic collective we have to focus on taking our recommendations forward.” 

Following the event, Cochrane PaPaS are considering next steps, this might be a prioritization series for a journal, or a commentary style piece. They are also hoping to see more funding coming into this area and to continue to advocate for more and better research into chronic pain in children.

Thursday, August 2, 2018

On the road: farewelling Elaine Beller

Tue, 07/31/2018 - 19:25

After 20 years of stellar contributions to Cochrane, Elaine Beller is shifting her keen focus from biostatistics to bushwalking, and embracing semi-retirement. Last week we caught up with Elaine on the road from outback Birdsville – a leisurely 27 hour drive from her home on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast. Though never one to seek the limelight, she was (after a little encouragement) happy to share some parting thoughts about her time as a prolific and multi-talented Cochrane contributor.  

Elaine Beller is widely recognised as having an amazing ability to analyse and explain the most complex of matters and methods - be it through her writing, research, teaching, statistical consulting or training materials. An Associate Professor of Biostatistics at Bond University, she’s worked as a biostatistician for some of Australia’s largest randomised clinical trials (RCTs). Through her research work, she has looked at improving the conduct, analysis and use of RCTs across cardiology, nephrology, oncology and orthopaedics. Add to that over 100 peer-reviewed papers and a host of workshops and training resources on clinical trials methods, systematic reviews and epidemiology, and you have a fraction of her distinguished career outside of the world of Cochrane.

Inside Cochrane, her contributions are similarly substantial. Elaine has been an author and statistician for 11 Cochrane Groups, and is a long-time member of both the Trainers Network and Statistical Methods Group among others. For the past three years she has been the Deputy Co-ordinating Editor of Cochrane Kidney and Transplant (CKT) and also worked closely with Acute Respiratory Infections (ARI) at Bond. With such an expert guiding hand in so many groups, projects and reviews, Elaine’s departure represents a significant loss of knowledge, skills and trademark good humour for her many colleagues and friends across the organisation. 

‘I’ve really enjoyed the variety of working for so many different groups and getting to know different disease areas in detail,’ Elaine says. ‘It’s been a difficult decision to step back from my Cochrane commitments but it’s time to spend more concentrated blocks of time on other things. Workwise I’ll still be at Bond developing a new Masters in Evidence Based Practice, supervising my PhD students and getting around to publishing a few unfinished papers. But I’ll also be able to travel a bit more and get to a few more of the folk festivals I’d love to see in different parts of Australia.’  

Looking back rather than forward, Elaine was what you might now call an early-adopter when it comes to all things Cochrane. ‘I first heard about systematic reviews when Dave Sackett visited Australia in the late ‘80s,’ she says. ‘He was such an amazing guy and I was fascinated by his ideas. We started looking at systematic reviews in our journal club at the Clinical Trials Centre at Sydney Uni and got to know about Cochrane reviews through that. Before long people started consulting me about the analysis of systematic reviews and it all evolved from there.’ 

In 2009 Elaine headed to Oxford for a sabbatical at the UK Cochrane Centre and the Centre for Statistics in Medicine, where she had the opportunity to pursue methodological research with Doug Altman. ‘I remember being so nervous the first time I was going to meet ‘The Great Doug Altman’, as I’d heard so much about him,’ Elaine laughs. ‘But of course Doug was just so humble and laid back. He was instrumental in getting me into the quality and methodological side of reviews more so than just statistical consulting, so he really changed the course of my career. I was quite devastated when he passed away recently.’

Elaine’s work with Doug sparked an ongoing interest in looking at and improving the way systematic reviews are written up. She returned to Australia from Oxford to join long-time colleague Paul Glasziou at the Centre for Research in Evidence Based Research at Bond University, and a conversation between the two about several confusing abstracts prompted them to publish a call to arms in JAMA in 2011. In it, they argued abstracts should include the main results in both numbers and words, and that the interpretation of results shouldn’t require statistical knowledge. 

‘That was our first methodological paper on abstracts and a lot of interesting work then arose out of that – including the PRISMA for Abstracts checklist that now gives authors a framework and guidance to present systematic reviews in a way that meets the needs of different readers. There’s still a long way to go, but we have seen some progress in the overall quality of abstracts – particularly Cochrane abstracts. I do think we should just have one abstract rather than a technical and a plain English abstract. The problem is that authors often assume readers have the necessary technical knowledge to understand what are often badly written technical abstracts, but as the research consistently shows even experienced clinicians often don’t understand them. I’m working on another paper in this area so hope to have a little more time to get that published before too long.’

Elaine’s many contributions to this and other important areas have been much valued within Cochrane and beyond, bringing as she does an unusual depth of knowledge across statistics, methods and the written word – areas that few people understand when taken together. Her skills and accessible approach will be greatly missed. Before wrapping up our interview and getting back to the first of many intrepid adventures of semi-retirement, Elaine offered some sage advice for future contributors. 

‘Getting involved in a systematic review as an author is a great thing, but at first just get involved as an author - not as a lead author,’ she concludes. ‘I see a lot of students take on a systematic review as a lead author and really struggle. So I think it’s better to come in as an author with an experienced lead before you take on your own. Overall, I just have to say that Cochrane is an incredible organisation that’s worth belonging to and getting involved with, because what you will learn and take out of it is just amazing.’

Image: Elaine arrives at Machu Picchu after a fantastic four day trek on the Inca Trail in Peru.  
Words: Shauna Hurley, originally posted on Cochrane Australia

Wednesday, August 1, 2018

Cochrane Library: an improved online platform to guide health decision-making across the world

Tue, 07/31/2018 - 16:24

Cochrane is pleased to announce that the Cochrane Library, which provides high-quality, independently produced evidence to inform healthcare decision-making, has been redesigned and enhanced to improve user experience and functionality.

Cochrane is a global independent network of researchers, professionals, patients, carers, and people interested in health. Cochrane contributors and groups produce high-quality systematic reviews, which collate and summarize the best available evidence on the effects of interventions, to inform decisions about health. Cochrane Reviews are recognized internationally as representing a gold standard for high-quality, trusted information, and are published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, one of the databases within the Cochrane Library.

The new online platform, designed in collaboration with Cochrane’s publisher Wiley and built by the technology platform provider HighWire, includes several features that will improve the user experience for people whose preferred language is not English, including improved visibility of non-English content, a new Spanish language homepage, and the ability to search in different languages. The new Cochrane Library also delivers a series of improved design features and functionality and allows users to search across varying content types, including Cochrane Reviews and Protocols, CENTRAL trials reports, Cochrane Clinical Answers, Editorials, Special Collections, and other systematic reviews from Epistemonikos, a collaborative, multilingual database of health evidence.

Cochrane’s Editor in Chief, David Tovey warmly welcomed today’s launch: “I am delighted to see the launch of our newly designed Cochrane Library today. This complex project has been all about improving user experience; we have ambitious plans for future development of the Cochrane Library and these can only be delivered by this move to a new and more flexible platform. With this launch, users will immediately notice a richer experience, but we see this is as merely the start of our journey.”

Wiley’s Editorial Director, Deborah Pentesco-Murphy added: “We are delighted that Wiley are able to offer Cochrane’s gold standard Evidence, including the Cochrane Clinical Answers Database, on a new multi-lingual platform, including a Spanish interface, to serve our global audience of users better and with an improved ability to quickly locate relevant information to make informed health decisions. ”

HighWire CEO, Dan Filby, said, “The Cochrane Library is globally recognized for publishing world leading research. We are proud to deliver a user experience for Cochrane that reflects the high quality of content; improving discoverability to help users in their research.”

For further information or to arrange an interview, please contact,
Jo Anthony
T +44 207 183 7503
pressoffice@cochrane.org

About Cochrane Reviews
Cochrane Reviews are systematic reviews of primary research in human health care and health policy, and are internationally recognized as the highest standard in evidence-based health care. Cochrane Systematic Reviews investigate the effects of interventions for disease prevention, treatment, and rehabilitation. They also assess the accuracy of a diagnostic test for a given condition in a specific patient group and setting.  Cochrane Library is published by Wiley.

About Wiley
Wiley, a global research and learning company, helps people and organizations develop the skills and knowledge they need to succeed. Our online scientific, technical, medical, and scholarly journals, combined with our digital learning, assessment and certification solutions help universities, learned societies, businesses, governments and individuals increase the academic and professional impact of their work. For more than 210 years, we have delivered consistent performance to our stakeholders. The company's website can be accessed at www.wiley.com

About HighWire

HighWire is the technology partner of choice for world-leading commercial and academic publishers. With offices globally, HighWire provides digital publishing solutions and platform expertise across all aspects of the publishing life cycle, including content management and hosting, e-commerce, analytics, access and identity management, manuscript submission and tracking. HighWire also delivers strategic consulting services for system and application development, and improving the customer experience.

Wednesday, August 8, 2018

Featured Review: Multifactorial and multiple component interventions for preventing falls in older people living in the community

Mon, 07/30/2018 - 17:33

"It is crucial that people have an understanding of what interventions work in what populations so as to make correct clinical and policy practice related decisions.”

An international team, supported by  Cochrane Bone, Joint & Muscle Trauma, assessed whether fall-prevention strategies that target two or more risk factors for falls are effective in preventing falls in older people living in the community.

As people age they are more likely to fall. Although most fall-related injuries are minor, they can cause significant pain and discomfort, affect a person's confidence and lead to a loss of independence. Some falls can cause serious long-term health problems. A combination of factors increases the risk of falls with ageing, such as weak muscles, stiff joints, hearing problems, changes in sight, side effects of medications, tiredness or confusion. Poor lighting, slippery or uneven surfaces, and issues with poor footwear can also increase the risk of falling.

Different interventions have been developed to help prevent falls in older people. They may involve a single type of intervention, such as exercise to increase muscle strength, or combinations of interventions, such as exercise and adjustment of a person's medication. A combination of two or more components can be delivered as either a multifactorial intervention based on an assessment of a person's risk factors for falling or as a multiple component intervention where the same combination of interventions is provided to all participants.

The lead author of the review, Dr Sally Hopewell, explains, "This review is an important update for anyone with an interest in falls in older people. It provides useful information on the benefits and risks associated with both multifactorial and multiple component interventions. The growing use of these more complex types of intervention for preventing falls reflect the theory that multiple risk factors are at play, and that these risk factor profiles vary between people.  It is crucial that people have an understanding of what interventions work in what populations so as to make correct clinical and policy practice related decisions.”

The team identified 43 trials that compared multifactorial interventions with an inactive control group.  They concluded that multifactorial interventions led to some reduction in the rate at which people fall but not the number of people who experienced one or more falls (fallers); however, the quality of the evidence was low.  They identified 17 trials that looked at multiple component interventions and concluded they probably reduce the rate at which people fall and the number of fallers compared with the inactive control group.

The review includes 62 randomised trials involving 19,935 older participants living in the community.

Wednesday, August 1, 2018

Pages