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Facilitative role of Fields: case study of topic prioritisation and reviewer support for production of global health promotion and public health review priorities |
The Cochrane review, which has historically been associated with medical research, is foreign to many in the field of health promotion and public health. In order to have more utility in this area, topics need to be identified that are of relevance to health promotion and public health decision making. And reviewers who can undertake reviews of these often complex interventions need to be identified from the field and supported through the Cochrane process to produce reviews that contain information needed by end users.
In 2002, the Cochrane Health Promotion and Public Health (HPPH) Field begaun a program of research to identify global public health decision making topics that would value from the production of a Cochrane review. The project utilised the support, knowledge and experience ofof an invited taskforce of individuaresearch advisorls from a number of global international health organisations. (The Priorities Taskforce). The overall aim of the project is to increase the number of Cochrane reviews of health promotion and public health topics that are of global importance. (based on pre-determined criteria, for example, burden of disease).
The specific objectives of the project were to:
1) Pprioritise health promotion and public health intervention topics for review,
2) Iidentify and secure funding opportunities to support the production of prioritised reviews, and
3) Iidentify and gain the commitment of reviewers to undertake these reviews.
Review topics were disseminated via the HPPH Field’s contact database, relevant Collaborative Review Groups, Cochrane publications and journal publications. This has generated almost 20 potential reviewers for select topics. As of April 2005, we havethe HPPH Field has review teams undertaking 7 of the 26 priority topicsreviews, with otherfurther priority reviewss soon to alsoplanned for commencement taken upin the near future.
This presentation will describe identify the barriers, opportunities and learnings of the project, with emphasis on reviewer recruitment, formation of advisory groups and the needs of new Cochrane reviewers. The presentation will be co-presented by the project coordinator and a priority topic review author to discuss we will discuss thethe potential facilitative role of Fields for reviewer support.