The Cochrane Collaboration-Advances and Challenges in Improving Evidence-based Decision Making

Abstract

The Cochrane Collaboration is an international organization that aims to help people make well-informed decisions about health care by preparing, maintaining, and ensur ing the accessibility of rigorous, systematic, and up-to-date reviews (and, where pos sible, meta-analyses) of the benefits and risks of health care interventions. This article describes the structure of the Cochrane Collaboration and the processes used to carry out the task of research transfer. The authors focus on recent achievements of the Collaboration, emphasize the current challenges and barriers the Collaboration is fac ing to live up to the expectations it has generated, and highlight the strategies that the organization is using to meet those challenges. Key words: research transfer; decision making; evidence-based medicine; systematic reviews; meta-analysis; education; in formatics ; Internet; communications. (Med Decis Making 1998;18:2-9)