HEALTH INFORMATION FORUM: Working together to improve access to reliable information for healthcare workers in developing and transitional countries

REPORT: Getting research into practice in developing countries

Royal College of Physicians, London, Tuesday 27th January, 2004

Objective: Lessons from medical research may take years to get through to the frontline of healthcare.  This is exacerbated in developing countries where there are difficulties in dissemination and barriers that prevent healthcare providers acting on new findings. Furthermore, most biomedical research is in high-income countries, and the results are not necessarily applicable in low-income countries. This meeting explored these issues through three short presentations followed by small-group and plenary discussion.

Input from HIF-net at WHO: There were two email contributions to the meeting, from Sri Lanka and USA

Chair: Tessa Richards, Assistant Editor, BMJ 

Presentations 

1. Dynamics and barriers

2. Systematic reviews: do they have a role?

3. Recent changes in healthcare information and emerging challenges

 

1. Dynamics and barriers, Jean Shaw, Partnerships in Health Information

 

About the speaker: Jean Shaw is a retired medical school librarian from the University of Leicester, UK. She is the Research Officer for Partnerships in Health Information, which seeks to support and create active partnerships between UK health science library and information services and those in developing countries. Phi's objectives are to support information professionals in developing countries in this way so that they are involved in the development of better systems to  make information accessible to health professionals.

 

See Hand-out which shows dynamics and barriers to information flows among community members, health workers and researchers

 

2. Systematic reviews: do they have a role? Paul Chinnock, Managing Editor, Cochrane Injuries Group / London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine 

 

About the speaker: Paul Chinnock taught in Kenya, then edited schoolbooks for developing countries. He retrained as a nutritionist and worked in The Gambia. He was Editor of Africa Health for most of the 1990s, and was also responsible for Medicine Digest, International Diabetes Digest and Caribbean Health. He became Managing Editor of the Injuries Group of the Cochrane Collaboration in September 2002. Paul would like there to be more information for evidence based medicine that reflects the realities of working in resource-poor environments. Paul has also worked as a freelance editor and writer for WHO, DFID, Panos Institute, Healthlink and the International Hospitals Federation.

 

See Powerpoint presentation (360 kb)

See Text of presentation

Further information: [email protected] 

 

3: Recent changes in healthcare information and emerging challenges, Luis Gabriel Cuervo, BMJ Knowledge

About the speaker: Luis Gabriel Cuervo is a clinical editor with the BMJ evidence-based journal, Clinical Evidence. He trained in medicine in Colombia in the 1980s. 

See Powerpoint presentation (1.9 Mb)

 

Small-group discussions (See Summary of Small-group discussions)

A. Are systematic reviews 'globally relevant', as is claimed, or do they only apply in high-income countries? See Summary.

B. What can we do to make sure that research findings from developing countries find their way into systematic reviews?

C. How can evidence-based practice be communicated in a way that is more accessible and relevant to healthcare providers in low-income countries? 

 

Plenary discussion: What more can be done to get research into practice?

See Key points from plenary discussion

The meeting was also reported in the BMJ, see: http://bmj.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/full/328/7435/310-b 

 

Acknowledgements: Thanks to the International Department of the Royal College of Physicians, which provided free facilities for this meeting, and to the BMJ Publishing Group and Exchange (a DFID-funded networking and learning programme on health communications for development), which provides financial support for HIF. Special thanks to Paul Chinnock, Luis Cuervo and Jean Shaw for help with the organization of this meeting, and to Indira Benbow (Simplexity) who helped compile this report.  

 

HIF meetings are organized by INASP-Health: www.inasp.info/health  with assistance from volunteers on the HIF organizing group.