On Friday, 29th June 2018, Cochrane enthusiasts from all over Croatia and neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina gathered in Split, at the University of Split School of Medicine, for the 10th Annual Croatian Cochrane Symposium. They were rewarded for their efforts with excellent presentations from this year’s invited speakers: Prof. Taryn Young, Director, Centre for Evidence-based Healthcare, Chief specialist scientist, Cochrane South Africa and Head, Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at Stellenbosch University, South Africa; Dr Tamara Lotfi, Secretariat Coordinator for the Global Evidence Synthesis Initiative and Ms. Selena Ryan-Vig, Communications & Engagement Officer at Cochrane UK and former facilitator of Students 4 Best Evidence (S4BE).

The topic of this year’s symposium ‘Building capacity for Cochrane Systematic Review production and dissemination’ drew a varied crowd of participants, from journal editors and health professionals to students and representatives of patient/consumer organisations. They had the opportunity to learn from Prof. Young how evidence maps are created and their role in informing research and practice, from Dr. Lotfi how to build capacity for systematic review production in research centres in LMICs, whereas Ms. Ryan-Vig enlightened students on their role in Evidence-based Health Care and provided numerous incentives for joining S4BE. Dr. Tina Poklepović Peričić, Co-Director of Cochrane Croatia, gave a thorough overview of the training materials available through Cochrane for capacity building and announced a new online training course in Croatian.

Given that 2018 also marks the 10th anniversary of the founding of Cochrane Croatia, Asst. Prof. Irena Zakarija-Grković, Co-Director of Cochrane Croatia, gave a brief overview of the first ten years of Cochrane Croatia, from first deliberations between Prof. Ana Marušić and Sir Iain Chalmers in 1994 on establishing a Cochrane Group in Croatia, followed by talks with Prof. Alessandro Liberati in 1997 about creating a Branch of the Italian Cochrane Centre in Croatia, which was realised in 2008, to the promotion of Cochrane Croatia to full, independent centre status in 2017. This was followed by a presentation on the vision and mission of Cochrane Bosnia and Herzegovina, Cochrane Croatia’s first Affiliate, founded in 2018, which was delivered by Cochrane Bosnia and Herzegovina’s first Director, Dr. Filipa Markotić.

The afternoon was reserved for practical workshops and round tables providing an opportunity for a capacity building strategy to be developed as well as for participants to gain first-hand experience in producing evidence maps and using the SPARK tool for prioritization of systematic review topics in health policy and systems research.

We thank the City of Split and the University of Split School of Medicine for sponsoring this year’s symposium as well as Cochrane South Africa for supporting Prof. Young. We are grateful to all our speakers for their effort, time and generousity and look forward to future collaborations.

Irena Zakarija-Grkovic
Co-Director,
Cochrane Croatia

Cochrane’s organizational Dashboard presents our achievements in key metrics.
 
We use it as an excellent tool to reflect on our accomplishments on a quarterly basis.
 
Here are just a few highlights from Q1 2018:

• The use of Cochrane.org has increased by 44% (YOY), with 71% of visits from non-English language browsers.
• Cochrane Crowd now has over 8,541 members, a 64% increase (YOY).
• 91% of new Cochrane Reviews were published with a summary of Findings table, up from 70% on the same periods in 2015.

See Cochrane’s QI2018 Dashboard in full
 
Find out more about Cochrane’s organizational Targets for 2018

This week Cochrane was given the opportunity to speak as part of the UK’s first ever Evidence Week at the Houses of Parliament in London, UK.

The initiative, led by Sense About Science, brought together MPs, peers, parliamentarians and others interested in science and health to talk about why health evidence is important and matters to global decision-makers.  It aimed to highlight the role of the House of Commons Library and share insights into the work of Parliament in seeking and scrutinizing the value of evidence for making better healthcare decisions. 

Cochrane joined Sense about Science, the House of Commons Library, the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology and House of Commons Science and Technology Committee as well as partners SAGE Publishing in arranging a week of events and briefings.

As part of the week of briefings, Dr Lynda Ware, Senior Fellow in General Practice at Cochrane UK, presented to wide-ranging delegates on how Cochrane uses high-quality, relevant, synthesized research evidence to help make informed decisions about health care. 

Dr Lynda Ware commented: “We are bombarded by health claims and it is difficult to make sense of them all. It is hard to filter out the fake and misleading from those that are true and evidence-based. As a global organization providing the very best analysis of research evidence available, Cochrane can help us find our way through this information to make informed decisions about health care.”

Attendees to Dr Ware’s talk came from government departments, independent fact checking organizations, press officers working in science communications as well as researchers looking at how evidence can help tackle some of the big social problems of our time  - homelessness and an aging population. 

• Read more about Evidence Week
• Read more about Dr Lynda Ware

The 2017 Journal Citation Report (JCR) has been released by Clarivate Analytics, and we are delighted to announce that Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (CDSR) Journal Impact Factor is now 6.754.

This is a significant increase on the 2016 Journal Impact Factor, which was 6.264.

The CDSR Journal Impact Factor is calculated by taking the total number of citations in a given year to all Cochrane Reviews published in the past two years, and dividing that number by the total number of Reviews published in the past 2 years. It is a useful metric for measuring the strength of a journal by how often its publications are cited in scholarly articles.

Some highlights of the CDSR 2017 Journal Impact Factor include:

• The CDSR is ranked 12 of the 154 journals in the Medicine, General & Internal category
• The CDSR received 62,332 cites in the 2017 Journal Impact Factor period, compared with 57,740 in 2016
• The five-year Journal Impact Factor is 7.669 compared to 7.084 in 2016.

Cochrane’s Editor in Chief, David Tovey, commented: “I am delighted to see a further rise in Impact Factor for the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews. There is also a pleasing increase in total citations, and the five year impact factor is strong. All of these data demonstrate the usage and impact of our reviews, and reflect enormous credit on our contributors and groups.”

The main Journal Impact Factor report and the Cochrane Review Group reports will be delivered in early August 2018.

• More information is available here on how the CDSR Journal Impact Factor is calculated.

We seek nominations to fill two vacant positions on the new Cochrane Methods Executive, to start in September 2018 at the Edinburgh Colloquium.

The new Methods Executive will take on more strategic responsibility supporting the Scientific Committee with its agenda, the Editorial Board on issues with methods implementation, and seeks to improve communication between different Cochrane structures with related methods interests, and the Methods Groups. The new Methods Executive will:

• Provide Cochrane with expertise advising on the state of the evidence for evidence synthesis methods;
• Engage with the strategic infra-structure supporting the Editor in Chief on content developments and future strategy;
• Ensure Cochrane has relevant intelligence on new and improved methods;
• Provide oversight aiding decisions on methods for use in Cochrane Reviews, methods for expert review and evaluation, and methods we should not use;
• Identify methods that fit with the priorities of decision-makers, guideline developers and other stakeholders to aid decision-making;
• Advise and support any experimental approaches in collaboration with the Editor in Chief and the Editorial Board;
• Maintain methods infra-structure by overseeing the Methods Groups and their Lead Convenors.

Executive constituency

We currently have two vacant positions for Methods Groups Convenors. The current Methods Executive is comprised of eight elected Methods Group Convenors.  In its new format the Methods Executive will see methodologists from the following roles represented: Senior Methods Adviser to the Editorial Board; Handbook Editor; Scientific Committee member and a member from the Cochrane Council.

The new Methods Executive also holds six positions for elected Methods Group convenors. Four of the current Convenors will remain to provide continuity and will step down over the next two years to allow the election of new members. Both the Methods Co-ordinator and Head of Membership, Learning and Support services will serve Ex Officio roles.

Experience required

The Methods Executive seeks two experienced, well-established Methods Group Convenors. They will have strong connections within the Cochrane community. Along with their specialist expertise they will be skilled in systematic review methodology. Experience of similar committees is an advantage. Methods expertise on the new Methods Executive currently covers diagnostic test accuracy, GRADE, information retrieval, qualitative evidence synthesis and statistics, so we particularly encourage members from other Methods Groups to step forward.

Commitment required

We expect members to attend meetings regularly, typically every 6-8 weeks, usually by teleconference with two face-to-face meetings twice a year. We also expect them to contribute to issues that arise by e-mail between meetings.  We currently fund travel and accommodation to attend the Mid-Year Governance meetings. We also fund travel and 3 nights' accommodation to attend Methods Executive-related meetings at Colloquia. (We do not fund Colloquium registration. Methods Executive members are expected to make use of the one complimentary registration per group or seek funding from their employer, or elsewhere).

The deadline for nominations is Friday 13 July 2018. To find out more and to apply, please visit Cochrane Methods.

Which is harder: getting kids to eat more fruit and vegetables, or maintaining the Cochrane living systematic review of the rapidly growing evidence base on how to get kids to eat more fruit and vegetables? This year, a magnificent team led by Rebecca Hodder based at Australia’s University of Newcastle has proved that the latter can be done.

The official pilot period for four living systematic reviews (LSRs) ends in June, and the Project Transform LSR team has been collecting rich process evaluation data to provide insights into the workload and workflow implications of adopting a living approach to systematic reviews and inform decisions about the future of LSRs in Cochrane. The LSR team looks forward to sharing the full results of the LSR pilot evaluation with the Cochrane community in Edinburgh. Slides from a recent webinar offer a sneak preview of some of the practical experiences of two of the LSR pilot teams.

One of the LSRs, ‘Interventions for increasing fruit and vegetable consumption in children aged five years and under,’ received additional support from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation as part of a broader Next Generation Evidence Systems project. This support has enabled the LSR team, working with Cochrane Heart and Project Transform’s machine learning and Cochrane Crowd citizen science platforms, to develop an automated workflow identifying RCTs from their monthly search results. With the help of this technology and a collaborative editorial and publishing approach, the team has published two updates since the start of the year, incorporating a total of 13 new studies since moving into living mode late 2017.

“There are definitely workload and project management challenges to adopting a living approach to systematic reviews” says Rebecca Hodder, lead of the LSR Interventions for increasing fruit and vegetable consumption in children aged five years and under. “Overall we found that maintaining the monthly searches and applying the RCT technology was much easier than anticipated. We’d advise any author team thinking about embarking on an LSR to seek out LSR expertise, adopt a strong project management approach and develop collaborative partnerships with your Information Specialist and editorial team.”

The experiences of the four LSR pilot teams and Cochrane editorial staff are an important contribution to the development of a methodologically robust and achievable model for Cochrane living systematic reviews. Rebecca’s team are leading the way and showing it can be done. Getting kids to eat more fruit and vegetables though? Now, that is still a major challenge!

Hodder RK, O'Brien KM, Stacey FG, Wyse RJ, Clinton-McHarg T, Tzelepis F, James EL, Bartlem KM, Nathan NK, Sutherland R, Robson E, Yoong SL, Wolfenden L. Interventions for increasing fruit and vegetable consumption in children aged five years and under. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2018, Issue 5. Art. No.: CD008552. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD008552.pub5

• Learn more about LSR

Support for Project Transform was provided by Cochrane and the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia (APP1114605). The contents of the published material are solely the responsibility of the Administering Institution, a Participating Institution or individual authors and do not reflect the views of the NHMRC.

Support for the Next Generation Evidence Systems project was provided by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the Foundation.

Living systematic reviews (LSRs) provide a new approach to support the ongoing efforts of Cochrane and others to produce evidence that is both trustworthy and current. Four author teams and editorial groups across Cochrane are currently involved in the pilot and evaluation of LSRs. The pilot will help us understand the feasibility of LSRs, the implications for the people and processes involved and identify opportunities to refine the LSR model before scaling up.

Living systematic reviews on venous thromboembolism

A team led by Elie Akl, American University of Beirut, and Holger Schünemann, McMaster University in Canada, working with Cochrane Gynaecological, Neuro-oncology and Orphan Cancers, is currently maintaining a suite of three Cochrane LSRs that will underpin guidelines by the American Society of Hematology (ASH) on the prevention and treatment of venous thromboembolism (VTE) in patients with cancer. ASH funded the work as part of a larger collaborative project with the McMaster University GRADE Centre to develop 10 guidelines on VTE (see press release here: American Society of Hematology—University of McMaster Clinical Practice Guidelines on Venous Thromboembolism).

The following Cochrane Reviews on VTE in patients with cancer are now being maintained as LSRs:

• Parenteral anticoagulation in ambulatory patients with cancer
• Oral anticoagulation in patients with cancer who have no therapeutic or prophylactic indication for anticoagulation
• Anticoagulation for the long-term treatment of venous thromboembolism in patients with cancer

The ASH guidelines are expected to be published in 2018. Similar to systematic reviews, guideline recommendations become outdated at variables rates. Increasingly, guideline developers internationally are starting to explore new processes and tools for timely update of recommendations, or for living guidelines. While there remains much to be explored about the living guideline model, a necessary prerequisite is the availability of LSR(s). ASH has begun discussions with the Cochrane team about using these LSRs to pilot a living guideline model.

Such a model “presents both opportunities and challenges,” says Rob Kunkle, Senior Manager of Guidelines at ASH. “Clinicians and patients need up-to-date guidance, especially on topics or questions where new evidence is likely to change a recommendation. At the same time, we need to figure out a surveillance and updating approach that is practical for our society to do, for our journal to publish, and for our guideline users to understand and implement. We look forward to exploring different approaches.”  

You can check for updates to these and Cochrane’s other LSRs in the What’s New section of these reviews on the Cochrane Library, and soon Cochrane will be capturing this information via its amended Update Classification System.

With these reviews now published in living mode, Elie and team can start the exciting work of testing how Cochrane’s living evidence can flow into living guideline recommendations. Elie says, “While we’ve been discussing living systematic reviews and living guidelines for few years now, it is exciting that we are contributing to making this happen. It wouldn’t have been possible without great partners, like Cochrane and the American Society of Haematology”.

• Learn more about LSRs

Support for Project Transform was provided by Cochrane and the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia (APP1114605). The contents of the published material are solely the responsibility of the Administering Institution, a Participating Institution or individual authors and do not reflect the views of the NHMRC.

The Cochrane Council exists to give Cochrane Members, from a broad range of constituencies, a voice in Cochrane’s future. The purpose of the Council is to provide:

• A forum for Cochrane Groups and Members to consider high-level matters affecting Cochrane as a whole;
• A mechanism to raise matters and provide input to the Governing Board on behalf of Cochrane Groups and Members; and
• A forum to consider matters at the request of the Board and inform Board deliberations.

Following the recent retirement of Author representative Julie Brown, the Council is seeking to elect a new member to join fellow Author rep María Ximena Rojas Reyes.

Any Cochrane Member who has published at least one Cochrane Review in the Cochrane Library is eligible to stand for election. Your name must be listed in the Authors section of the Cochrane Review, but you do not have to be lead/correspondence Author on the Review.

This is a voluntary, unpaid role and each year you’ll need to commit to attending two face-to-face meetings at different locations internationally and regular teleconferences. Your expenses will be paid. The term of appointment is three years, from August 2018 to August 2021, and you should be available to attend the Cochrane Colloquium in Edinburgh this September.

Cochrane’s Governing Board is seeking to elect a new member. Cochrane is an international organisation and a registered charity in the UK, and members of the Governing Board from around the world are ‘Trustees’ of the charity. The Trustees carry ultimate responsibility for Cochrane and this is a critically important role. More information about being a Trustee of a UK charity is available from the UK Charity Commission. 

This is an exciting opportunity to join an international team providing strategic oversight to Cochrane, making sure the organisation’s work is effective and innovative, and that it delivers on its mission to promote evidence-informed health decision making by producing high-quality, relevant, accessible systematic reviews and other synthesised research evidence.

Candidates must be Cochrane Members. We welcome nominations from individuals with the skills required to fulfil the responsibilities of a Trustee. We are especially seeking candidates who have one or more of the following areas of expertise, in order to complement those of existing Board members:

• Financial management
• Organisational governance
• Human Resources management/management of people
• Legal experience
• Knowledge translation/transfer and communication
• Consumer engagement
• Evidence-informed health care or policy

In line with the usual requirements for UK charity Trustees, this is a voluntary, unpaid role. Each year you will need to commit to attending two face-to-face meetings at different locations internationally, and at least three teleconferences.  You will be expected to be a member of one or more Board Sub-Committees. Your expenses will be paid to attend these meetings. The term of appointment is three years, from August 2018 to August 2021, and you should be available to attend the Cochrane Colloquium in Edinburgh this September.

The deadline for nominations is Sunday 15 July 2018. To find out more, please visit elections.cochrane.org.

Cochrane’s Governing Board is delighted to announce it has appointed Marguerite Koster as its new Co-Chair, taking over from Cindy Farquhar, who finishes her term in September 2018.

Marguerite is a Senior Manager at Kaiser Permanente, one of the largest not-for-profit health plans in the U.S., serving 12.2 million members. She oversees the efforts of the Southern California Permanente Medical Group’s Evidence-Based Medicine Services Unit within Kaiser Permanente’s Southern California Region, which provides medical care to 4.5 million members.

She joined Cochrane’s Governing Board in 2016 as one of its first externally appointed members following its transition from a Steering Group, and has since played an active role as a Cochrane Trustee, serving as Treasurer, Chair of the Finance, Audit & Investment Subcommittee, and a member of the Remuneration Subcommittee and the Cochrane/G-I-N Partnership Advisory Group. In addition, Marguerite brings valuable experience to the Board in clinical practice guideline development, health technology assessment, knowledge translation and evidence-based implementation.

From September she will work alongside fellow Co-Chair, Martin Burton. The Board extends its congratulations to Marguerite, and thanks to Cindy Farquhar for four years of outstanding service as Co-Chair.

Additional resources:

• Governing Board membership
• Full list of meeting minutes and open access papers.