Introduction: Many Review Groups within the Collaboration are dealing with problems of global importance. Over 77% of the world population live in low/middle income countries. Sheer weight of numbers may dictate that most people with, for example, chronic airways disease, diabetes, pre-eclampsia or schizophrenia, are living in these countries. Compared with higher income countries, lower income nations have scarce resources for provision of care and so there is an urgent need to identify effective - and cost efficient - interventions.

Objective: To describe the experience of a single reviewer (KS), from Brazil, working within a Cochrane Collaborative Review Group.

Methods: A case report.

Results: KS, funded by a Brazilian post graduate grant (CAPES), has worked in the UK, with the Cochrane Schizophrenia Group. She is in the latter stages of a PhD focusing on tardive dyskinesia (a movement disorder often seen in those with schizophrenia). The thesis includes several systematic reviews also published on Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews (CDSR). KS had a background in epidemiological research but was new to methodical literature searching and systematic reviewing. During this time KS was supervised and trained by JM (Brazil) and CA (UK). The Schizophrenia Group, KS and those with tardive dyskinesia have benefited from this collaboration.

Discussion: This experience provides a practical example of how people from different health care cultures can work together. If the reviews within the CDSR are not to be impoverished by a one-sided perspective, global collaboration is crucial. Systematic reviews are a powerful, relatively inexpensive, way by which people from lower income countries can help evaluate the health care provision for everyone - not just a fraction (23%) of the worlds' population.