A Cochrane Plain language summary is a stand-alone summary of a Cochrane Review written in plain English. It briefly describes the key question and findings of the review. It is clearly set out, uses words and sentence structures that are easy to understand, and avoids technical terms and jargon. A clear, simple summary written in plain language helps people to understand complex health evidence. Cochrane Plain language summaries are freely available on cochrane.org and in the Cochrane Library in a range of languages. The aim is that anyone looking for information about the key points of a Cochrane Review can read and understand them.

The Cochrane Library Editorial Board recently approved new guidance and template for writing Plain Language Summaries in Cochrane Reviews. The guidance replaces the previous set of standards, the Plain Language Expectations for Authors of Cochrane Summaries (‘PLEACS’), it has been incorporated into the online version of the Cochrane Handbook. The template headings and guidance have also been incorporated into our recommended intervention review template.

 
The guidance and template have been developed by the three Plain Language Summary writers hired by Cochrane as part of a pilot in 2020: Nicole Pitcher, Denise Mitchell, and Carolyn Hughes. The guidance can be accessed as a supplement to the Reporting Chapter of the Cochrane Handbook. The guidance does not only draw on the experience of the PLS project, it looks to previous work including the original set of expectations outlined in PLEACS. However, it is no longer based on a set of standards, and instead focuses more on describing how authors and editors should approach the process of writing in plain language and using the GRADE statements to describe the results of systematic reviews. 
 
The template has a new standardised set of headings, including a top line 'Key messages'. You can view the headings and guidance in our recommended intervention review template. Editorial teams are encouraged to use this template, to ensure the new headings are included in all new titles registered via Editorial Manager. Headings can also be copied from the template into protocols and reviews in progress. The template has been developed from work on intervention reviews but examples from diagnostic test accuracy reviews are also incorporated in to the guidance. If you have any queries about using review templates, or incorporating the new headings into your existing template, please contact Cochrane Support: support@cochrane.org.  
 
For all ongoing reviews in the pre-submission phase, authors are expected to write their Plain Language Summaries according to the new template and its associated guidance. For reviews that have been submitted for editorial process it is advised but not expected for them to adopt the new template for the Plain Language Summary.

• Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions
  • III.S2 Supplementary material: Guidance for writing a Cochrane Plain language summary

It is with great sadness that we mark the passing of Chris Del Mar AM, Professor of Public Health at Bond University and one of Australia’s most prolific and generous Cochrane contributors. We echo the sentiments of his wife Professor Tammy Hoffman who shared the news yesterday on twitter, saying:

‘Chris has helped and inspired countless patients, medical students, doctors and researchers. He was an original thinker and unafraid to challenge the evidence behind conventional beliefs and practices. His decades of research influenced practice and policy in Australia and around the world.’

‘Chris is renowned for his wisdom, compassion, wit, intelligence, integrity, entertaining stories and humour. He was kind, generous, always a gentleman and genuinely interested in those around him.’

These qualities and contributions are reflected in the tribute to Chris published in The Medical Republic yesterday. It details the myriad ways Chris contributed professionally and personally to better the lives of others and inspire the next generation of researchers and clinicians across many different fields. 

Chris was a literal and figurative giant whose contribution to Cochrane in Australia and internationally was immense. He led the Cochrane Acute Respiratory Infections Group for two decades, supporting and mentoring the next generation of Cochrane authors, and never shied away from tackling controversial topics or challenging conventional orthodoxies. Chris was a lively contributor to several Cochrane Australia symposiums and Cochrane colloquiums and his presence and charm will be greatly missed.

We send our thoughts and deepest sympathies to Tammy, Chris’s family and his many friends and close colleagues at this sad time.

Reposted with permission from Cochrane Australia 

The Annual Anne Anderson Walk is a cherished annual social event in Cochrane, where attendees explore the Colloquium host-city by foot with a guide. Donations by participants are made to next year's Anne Anderson Award. Given current COVID-19 circumstances, the Cochrane community will be not be gathering for the Colloquium in 2022. However, we can walk virtually together, share pictures of our walks, and make donations to the annual Anne Anderson Award, which will be presented at the Cochrane AGM later this year.

• Learn more about the Anne Anderson Walk and Award

 It's easy to participate! 

• Go for a walk and snap a picture!
• Print out an Anne Anderson sign (or create your own personalized sign) to hold up for the picture, if you'd like.
  
  For Black and White Print:
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• Show your support on social media; post your picture and encourage your Cochrane colleagues to participate using the hashtag #AnneAnderson
• Share a picture to be added to the map; email Lydia Parsonson <lparsonson@cochrane.org> a picture, your name, your location, and any words of encouragement you have to other participants or a description of where you are in the picture. It will be added to this page and used in a final presentation at the end of the event. 
• Make a donation to the Anne Anderson Award. If you would like, you can make a donation, the prize will be given out at the Cochrane AGM later this year. 

Check out our global community's pictures:

Pictures from our 2021 Anne Anderson Walk:

To add your picture, email Lydia Parsonson <lparsonson@cochrane.org>  a picture, your name, and your location.  It will be added to this page and used in a final presentation at the end of the event. 

Dear Community members and friends,

This year takes us a step nearer our open access commitment. We know how important it is to make the best evidence freely available to all those who need it - the experience of the pandemic reinforces that, and our funders expect it. With that commitment there is a financial challenge that we are determined to meet, so in 2022 we will be continuing the step by step transformation of Cochrane we launched in 2021 in line with Strategy for Change.

Funders globally are re-evaluating their priorities and approaches – we want to make sure that Cochrane is positioned to continue to secure funds into the future - which is imperative if we are to be sustainable and able to continue our important work.

The future of evidence synthesis
Following the consultation on the future of evidence synthesis proposals, the Governing Board on 9th Feb 2022 approved the proposed change to Cochrane’s evidence synthesis production model and the immediate move to implementation activities. They asked the Executive Leadership Team to: 

• work with partners to set up a small number of externally funded Evidence Synthesis Units (ESUs), to be located in both high- and low- or middle-income countries
• develop collaborative arrangements across the community to ensure we maintain our valuable skills and expertise. These new groups will be shaped thematically to work in collaboration with other Cochrane entities to: support the developmental and editorial processes for evidence syntheses; identify and focus on global priorities; engage in knowledge translation and stakeholder and community engagement
• expand the Central Editorial Service to handle the editorial process for all evidence syntheses published on the Cochrane Library, including a direct pathway and a fast-track service, to strengthen consistency and delivery. 

The Governing Board will monitor and maintain oversight, so that, as a community, we continue to learn and develop and adapt as we progress. 

Your views on the proposals shared last year were key and informed the recommendation agreed by the Governing Board, who felt this was the best way to secure Cochrane’s funding and future. We look forward to your continued engagement as this is central to shaping the new thematic groups and structures outside of Evidence Synthesis Units, and finding ways to maintain and enhance the community connections that are so fundamental to Cochrane.
There remain challenges and uncertainties and this change will not be achieved overnight. The approach will be phased so that, as we move forward into implementation, we retain the best of what we have as well as make the right changes for the future.  
 

~ Find out more about the future of evidence synthesis in Cochrane here ~

For direct access to the proposal approved by the board, click here. 

Other priorities for 2022

Context
Our response to the pandemic showed the best of what we could do. We delivered rapid, living reviews, and shared the best evidence freely to support the world in tackling an unprecedented challenge. That learning and the consultations with all of you over 2020/21 informed the Strategy for Change, which is guiding our priorities in 2022 and 2023.  2021 was a year of transformation and achievement. Read more about it in our end of year message. Among other things we held wide consultation on the future of evidence synthesis. We also reviewed and restructured the Central Executive Team (CET) to save £2.3m (23%) on the 2021 budget for 2022, and achieve breakeven budgets in 2023 and 2024. We established a Director of Development role to lead on global fundraising, and introduced five-year financial planning to help navigate the opportunities and challenges ahead.

2022 Priorities
The key strategic priorities for 2022 were agreed by the Governing Board in December 2021 - the full list can be found in the Appendix. As well as prioritising changes to the future of evidence synthesis (as above), in summary they are:

• Open Access (OA) Transition plan, including product development (Strategy for Change GOAL 3) Have a roadmap in place by the end of the year to deliver full Open Access by 2025.
• Income generation and diversification (Strategy for Change Sustainability objective) To diversify and increase our income, mitigating the loss of subscription income due to Open Access.
• Advocacy post Cochrane Convenes (Strategy for Change GOAL 2) Shaping an advocacy programme that supports our goals, building on the key themes from Cochrane Convenes.
• Central Executive Team (CET) culture and ways of working (Strategy for Change Accountability objective) To ensure the new CET Structure works effectively with and for the community to deliver our collective goals.

All of these priorities look to the future (as far as we can), reshaping Cochrane to be able to anticipate and respond to further change, building on our collective experience of almost thirty years. The core of what we do remains the same.  Our principles remain the same. BUT the way we produce reviews, share them and advocate for evidence will change – must change – so we continue to have the impact on the world we want to – better health for all.

The Governing Board is confident we have the right strategy, the right policies, and the right people - including you - to deliver these ambitions. There is much to look forward to, and every reason to be optimistic and excited about Cochrane’s future.  And of course, we will be welcoming a new Chief Executive later in the year.  

Cochrane stands for collaboration, and its extraordinary, global community. Working together -  what we do best – will guarantee Cochrane’s continued success and impact , improving health for all.  We hope you are as excited as we are, and ready to engage with this next phase.  

Catherine Marshall, Co-chair        
Tracey Howe, Co-chair

on behalf of the Cochrane Governing Board

In 2021, we presented a new model for producing evidence synthesis to the Cochrane community, a model built to be sustainable, attractive to suitable funders and allowing us to flexibly respond to global health issues with timely synthesized evidence.

Many of you provided excellent feedback for which I’d sincerely like to thank you. Through the workshop series and the online survey we heard your acknowledgement of the need for change, your expectations and hopes for the future, but also your concerns about the new model.

The feedback we’ve received over the past few months is now summarised and available on the Future Cochrane site. You can also access the reports of this feedback here.

The feedback is also being incorporated into a business case that will be presented and discussed by the Governing Board in early February.

In March 2022, we will share the outcomes of the Board discussion with the Cochrane community and outline the next steps in developing the new model. We will rely on your continued engagement and commitment to develop a model that works for Cochrane and users of Cochrane’s evidence, and that ensures we can continue to deliver on our mission of producing trusted synthesized evidence, making it accessible to all, and advocating for its use.

Karla Soares-Weiser, Cochrane’s Editor in Chief
On behalf of the Evidence Production and Methods Directorate Senior Team

• Visit the Community Engagement Workshop series here

Dear Community members and friends,

Context
So much happens in a year. Last year, Cochrane responded quickly to the pandemic with rapid, living reviews – sharing the best evidence on key interventions and diagnostic tests to support the world in tackling this unprecedented challenge.  We made all of our Coronavirus (COVID-19) resources freely available, open access – which they remain today, including our COVID-19 Study Register which now has references to well over 100,000 studies. Our work has never been more important or relevant.

We find ourselves still living with the pandemic in 2021. The rollout of vaccines has been a great global achievement, but exacerbated health inequalities as the global north rolled out vaccinations, and the global south has been left behind.

2021 was the year we committed to full Open Access publishing by 2025, as part of making our evidence accessible, usable, and available to all. This is a vital step towards achieving our vision of “better health for all people”, and also reflects the fantastic drive towards open access across the publishing sector and particularly for peer reviewed research – core to our work and impact. This will have implications for our income and business model, and so we plan to diversify our income streams and our products.  

We were fortunate this year to receive over £17m funding from global funders to Cochrane groups globally. We look forward to continuing those relationships and working with them to do even more to improve health for all people. 

Transformation
In this context, we have launched a programme of transformation to ensure we maintain our relevance and pre-eminence into the future. Our ‘Strategy for Change’ describes our priorities for working in a changing environment through to 2023, building on the insight and feedback of the extraordinary Cochrane community, and the experience of the pandemic.   Cochrane Reviews are recognized internationally as a gold standard for high-quality, trusted health information. We do not accept commercial or conflicted funding, which is vital for us to generate authoritative and reliable information, working freely, unconstrained by commercial and financial interests. This makes it even more important that we adapt and change, and get fit for the future so we can not only survive but thrive into the future.

As part of that transformation programme, over the last three months the Cochrane community has discussed:

• How we can remain true to our values while adapting to challenges;
• How we remain the standard-setter for evidence synthesis; and
• How to change to ensure we produce timely, high-quality evidence that serves the different users of evidence.

Achievements
2021 has been another year of exceptional achievement for Cochrane.  Highlights include:

• The Impact Factor for the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews grew to 9.266.
• In 2021, 3100 authors prepared new and updated reviews by summarising evidence from over 10,000 included studies
• We made statements at two World Health Assemblies - advocating for the need of evidence synthesis in the response to COVID-19
• We hosted a major event - Cochrane Convenes: Preparing for and responding to global health emergencies: what have we learnt from COVID-19
• The Cochrane Library now has a total of 17 national and regional licenses, representing immediate full access for more than 500 million people.

See more of our achievements

Plans for 2022
Your contributions shaped the strategy for change and have offered valuable insights as we consider the future. They ensure we can together build a sustainable future and remain at the forefront of evidence synthesis. We will now be determining the direction of travel for how we produce evidence synthesis in future, and progressing implementation of this multi-year change programme. We continue to improve our process, structures and systems for evidence production to be able to respond quickly and reliably to user-needs, whilst demonstrating good research and publishing practice.

In 2022, we will be seeking new ways to generate income and be sustainable in the context of our commitment to Open Access, funding challenges and competition.  We will be recruiting a new Chief Executive, and a Director of Development to lead on fundraising.

We are hugely proud of our Cochrane Community whose collective energy, drive and enthusiasm make such a difference. Collaboration is our watchword and we work together to achieve our goals bringing together diverse interests, expertise, and geographies.  While there are challenges, we know it is more important than ever to share our evidence and contribute to a world of better health for all people.

Thank you for all you do. We are hugely optimistic about the future, and look forward to seeing you and working with you in 2022 and beyond.  All the best for the holidays and new year.

Tracey Howe, Co-chair

Catherine Marshall, Co-chair

Karla Soares-Weiser, Editor-in-Chief

Judith Brodie, Interim Chief Executive

The Cochrane Council welcomes Monserrat Conde, who was recently appointed as the Council member representing Cochrane Fields alongside Stefano Negrini, Council Co-Chair.

Monserrat is a Co-director and the Field Executive of Cochrane Campbell Global Ageing Partnership (CCGAP), where she is involved in evidence syntheses and leads knowledge translation projects such as the CCGAP Wikipedia project. As an early career researcher, she advocates for evidence-informed policies to foster age-inclusive societies.

Monserrat is currently a member of the WHO International Consortium on Evidence and Metrics for Healthy Ageing, developing consultancy work for the UN Decade of Healthy Ageing (2021-2030). Her professional background also encompasses senior roles in non-profit sectors and extensive experience in physiotherapy practice and higher education.

• Learn more about the Cochrane Council

The Anne Anderson Award recognizes a female member of Cochrane who has made a significant contribution to the enhancement and visibility of women's participation within Cochrane. The winner then designates the cash award to assist a woman from a low-resource setting with her Cochrane activities. Here the winner of the 2021 cash award reports back a year later.

The Anne Anderson Award is one of several prizes awarded annually (in 'normal times'). The goal of the Anne Anderson Award is to recognize and stimulate individuals contributing to the enhancement of women’s visibility and participation in Cochrane’s leadership. In the footsteps of Anne Anderson, many outstanding women continue to contribute and inspire other women to improve health knowledge for the good of their communities.

The Award recipient receives a plaque from Cochrane honouring her contributions (usually, this would happen at the annual Colloquium). She then designates the cash award of 3000 USD to assist a woman from a low-resource setting with her Cochrane activities, who should eventually provide a brief written report on how the funds have been used.

2021 Anne Anderson award winner, Jackie Ho nominated Wai Cheng to receive the award money.
Wai Cheng is a Paediatrician from Malaysia. We spoke to her to find out her plans for the prize money.

How will receiving the prize money help you personally?
It means I will be able to further develop my advocacy work to promote Kangaroo Care (KC) here in Malaysia. The Cochrane review, Kangaroo mother care to reduce morbidity and mortality in low birthweight infants, by Agustin Conde-Agudelo and colleagues shows that besides improving survival in preterm infants, it has other benefits. This is why WHO have endorsed it as an essential care. In spite of this we know that KC uptake in Malaysia has been generally low. It is for this reason that Kangaroo Mother Care Advocates Malaysia (KAMY), an advocacy group, is established in Malaysia and I am currently the secretary. So far, our work has been mainly in providing KC training to healthcare institutions and our members are all healthcare personnel. Due to lack of manpower, we have done little towards patient and public involvement in KC advocacy. Receiving the prize money means that I will be able develop a strategy to involve patients and the public in advocacy work.
 
What are your future plans?
I plan to set up a website to reach out to the public and engage someone with an interest to maintain it. Once the webpage is set up, I aim to identify people (patients and the public) to join and advocate KC with the aim of creating a demand for kangaroo care that pushes the healthcare system to support KC both during hospitalisation and at home, for preterm and term alike. We also hope to bring the public into KAMY to work together in implementing and sustaining KC practices in Malaysia.
 
What is your message to people thinking about submitting a nomination for the Anne Anderson Award?
I think that Jackie, the 2021 winner who nominated me to use the award money, is the perfect example of the type of person that should be nominated for the Anne Anderson Award. I truly appreciate that someone took the time and effort to nominate her. She is an advocate herself and even played a role helping me in the establishment of KAMY. She works to improve the lives of women who are around her and she has the contacts with people who can use the award money to improve the lives of others. In fact, with KC, I believe the money will not only save lives but will bring about improved healthcare for women and their babies in Malaysia.  

• To find out more about the Anne Anderson award, please visit https://community.cochrane.org/news/anne-anderson-prize-recognizing-enhancement-and-visibility-women-cochrane

Dear Colleagues,

Cochrane’s Central Executive Team offices will be closed from Friday 24th December 2021 and will reopen on Tuesday 4th January 2022.

During this period, out-of-office alerts will be activated – this includes for all IT support issues. We will be monitoring Cochrane platforms to reduce the chances of any unplanned or emergency downtime, but will not be responding to general queries. The technical support inbox will not be monitored.

If you note any issues with the Cochrane Library during this time, please contact Wiley directly by email: servicenow@wiley.com. Please ensure the subject line of your message includes the words ‘Cochrane Library’.

Although it will be possible to mark reviews and translations for publication during this time, please be advised that we will not be in a position to address problems with publication. Any high priority reviews that you intend to publish over this period should now wait until our offices reopen in January.  

For all external enquiries, please direct requests to pressoffice@cochrane.org

Please feel free to contact Cochrane Support at support@cochrane.org and one of the team will be in contact on their return from 4th January.

Our best wishes for a safe and happy holidays.

Cochrane Central Executive Team

The agenda for the Cochrane Council meeting to be held by videoconference on December 1 are now available to view online. The supporting papers can be viewed here

The Council aims to ensure that Cochrane Groups retain an effective voice in Cochrane’s leadership and strategic decision-making. The purpose of the Council is to provide:

• A forum for Cochrane Groups 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’s communities Groups; and
• A forum to consider matters at the request of the Board and inform Board deliberations.

Learn more about the Cochrane Council