Please find below the main decisions by the Cochrane Steering Group (CSG) from the London meeting. If you have any questions about these decisions, please contact your Steering Group Representative. The full minutes will be available soon.

Cochrane Canada
Decision: The CSG expressed continued support for Cochrane Canada and appreciation for the extensive efforts of many contributors working to Save Cochrane Canada. Full details of this decision and plan will be available shortly.

Governance reform
Decision: Following initial consultation and a Strategic Session at the Mid-Year Meetings in London, the CSG agreed to proceed with the proposed reforms to Cochrane’s governance structures. The CSG discussed the feedback received on the proposals and is committed to ensuring a meaningful voice for Groups in Cochrane’s governance, and support for participation by contributors. The next steps will be to draft specific amendments to Cochrane’s Articles of Association, and a more detailed framework for the propose Council for consultation with all contributors. A final decision about the reforms will be made at the Seoul Colloquium in October 2016.

Review of structure and function
Decision: The CSG considered a proposal for changes to the way Cochrane operates arising from the recent review of structure and function. The key changes will be the introduction of centralized editorial processing and the consolidation of Cochrane Groups into geographic and topic-based networks. Cochrane Groups will be integral in the next steps of this work, with further details to follow.

Approved papers

• Plain Language Summaries pilot
• Environmental sustainability policy
• Data Protection Policy

Past and future meetings
The minutes of the CSG meeting in Vancouver in January 2016 have been approved and are now available.
 

Lisa Bero and Cindy Farquhar
Co-Chairs, Cochrane Steering Group

14 April, 2016

The Iberoamerican Cochrane Centre and the Clinical Epidemiology Service of the Hospital of Sant Pau will hold a conference of CIBERESP (CIBER de Epidemiología y Salud Pública; Biomedical Research Networking Centres of Epidemiology and Public Health) on 21-22 April  2016. The focus of the conference will be on 'Research to Improve Appropriateness of Clinical and Care Practice'. This conference will be held within the scope of the CIBERESP and are open to all attendees.

The event will take place in the impressive Art Nouveau site of the Hospital of Sant Pau in Barcelona, Spain. The conference will include different talks, communications, and workshops. The attendance to the sessions will be free but you are kindly requested to register beforehand.

Check the programme in Spanish here. For more information please contact: comunica@cochrane.es.

The Cochrane Steering Group, in its January 2016 Vancouver meeting, approved a revision of Cochrane’s partnership policy. It also supported the proposed partnership framework. This framework is a useful tool for all Cochrane Groups when developing or evaluating their partnerships.

In 2016, more tools will be developed to support Cochrane Groups in partnership development. We expect these resources will be useful in making partnerships beneficial to Cochrane as well as to our external partners.

For suggestions and comments regarding external partnerships, please contact:

Sylvia de Haan, Partnerships Co-ordinator, Communications and External Affairs

Cochrane's Project Transform team was recently awarded a Partnership Project grant (2016-2018) of AU$930,416 from the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council.

"This three-year grant is very welcome," says project lead Julian Elliott. "This funding will help us find the best way to bring together automation, crowdsourcing and Cochrane's global network of contributors to transform the way evidence is produced. We'll expand our current research and evaluation activities, particularly across our automation and crowdsourcing initiatives, and set up demonstration projects with the Australian guideline development community. Ultimately the grant will help us move more rapidly towards effective and efficient evidence and guideline production."

Questions about Project Transform can be directed to transform@cochrane.org

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 World Health Organization (WHO) Executive Board, during its meeting in January 2016, decided to maintain Cochrane’s status as a non-governmental organization (NGO) in official relations with the WHO. Our report of activities for 2013-2015 and our plan of work for 2016-2018 (reported on earlier here) were both approved. 

This WHO decision is important. Cochrane’s official relation status allows us to attend, as an observer, a range of WHO meetings, and facilitates all other interactions with WHO.

We would like to thank you all once again for your continuing commitment and engagement in working with WHO, through your various Cochrane activities and roles.

Your suggestions to further strengthen our relation with WHO are most welcome. We would also like to know about your engagements with WHO – in meetings, expert groups, or other projects – allowing us to build on all existing connections in making the most of this strategic partnership. 

Sylvia de Haan, Partnerships Co-ordinator, Communications and External Affairs

Cochrane Learning Live is a new series of free monthly webinars aimed at anyone interested in learning skills or gaining knowledge and experience relating to Cochrane activities.  The series is managed by Cochrane’s Learning and Support Department. You can learn what topics are planned, watch videos of past webinars and find information aboout presenting here.

Next in the series is 'Consumers for the Terrified – Exploring new ways of involving consumers in the work of Cochrane' on 12 April. Topics will include new ways of getting consumers involved and the latest news about the Cochrane Membership Scheme, the Cochrane Crowd/Citizen Science project, Task Exchange and Cochrane Training. This webinar would be of interest to review authors, Managing Editors, Co-ordinating Editors, Cochrane Centre staff, consumers, and anyone interested in exploring ways of increasing the participation of consumers in the work of Cochrane. You can sign-up for this free webinar here. 

We are pleased to announce that the second funding round of a one-year pilot of the Cochrane Review Support Programme is now open.

Key features of the programme:

• All Cochrane Review Groups may apply for the awards.
• Groups may nominate no more than two titles – either new reviews or review updates – from the November 2015 revision of the Cochrane Priority Review List. Titles added to the list after Nov 2015 cannot be proposed for this funding round.
• 10 grants of £5,000 each will be awarded
• We will aim to decide the list of successful reviews and to have notified the applicants by mid-June 2016
• Reviews must be published a maximum of 13 months after the awards are notified

Cochrane recognizes that these awards are insufficient to meet the full costs of conducting reviews; rather, they are intended to facilitate and possibly accelerate publication of high priority reviews that are already planned or underway.

Applications close at 5pm GMT, Friday 6 May 2016. An application form can be found on the Cochrane Review Support Programme page on the CEU website.

Ovarian cancer is the seventh-most common cancer in women worldwide and has poor survival rates largely attributed to late-stage presentation. Women who have a suspicious ovarian mass without obvious disease outside of the ovary usually require surgery for diagnosis and staging. A new Cochrane Review provides crucial evidence on the accuracy of frozen section analysis, a rapid diagnostic test that can inform management decisions of suspicious ovarian mass during surgery.

Jo Morrison is a Co-ordinating Editor of Cochrane Gynaecological, Neuro-Oncology and Orphan Cancers and Toby Lasserson is a Senior Editor in the Cochrane Editorial Unit. In a new Cochrane Library editorial, they share their opinions on how they think this important review can guide clinical decision making.

Read the Editorial: 'Finding time to make the right decision: using frozen section to inform intra-operative management of suspicious ovarian masses'

In January 2015 the Cochrane Priority Reviews List was launched, and has become a ‘living’ record of Cochrane’s attempt to identify titles that are of greatest importance to our stakeholders and are likely to impact significantly on health outcomes worldwide. Cochrane-wide prioritisation remains an important project and has been included in the Strategy to 2020 Targets for 2016. After the first year of the project we have a better sense of the strengths and weaknesses of our initial framework and believe it is now time to revise it. 

A paper outlining the new framework and submission requirements and a new submission form are available on the CEU website. From March 2016, Cochrane Review Groups that have not undertaken a formal prioritisation process and wish to submit new titles should use this form. 

Ruth Foxlee, Information Specialist, Cochrane Editorial Unit

David Tovey, Editor in Chief, The Cochrane Library, and Deputy Chief Executive Officer

Following consultation with current Trials Search Coordinators (TSCs), the Cochrane Steering Group (CSG) has approved the TSCs’ recommendation that their title be changed to ‘Information Specialist’ and the title of Assistant Trials Search Coordinator be changed to ‘Assistant Information Specialist’.

As the job title of TSC is not used outside of Cochrane, its remit is not clear externally. ‘TSC’ also does not encompass either the diverse range of tasks that TSCs perform, or the varied skill sets they bring to the organization.

Bringing the Cochrane role title in line with the wider library and information profession is important for the professional recognition and career progression of current post-holders, and for the future recruitment of suitably qualified and experienced candidates to Cochrane.

This title change is effective across Cochrane as of 1 March 2016. If you have questions about this, please contact Elizabeth Stovold (estovold@sgul.ac.uk) in her capacity as CSG representative for the TSCs/Information Specialists.