Article type
Year
Abstract
Background: The health of humans is closely linked to the health of animals and animal production systems. Diseases that can be transmitted between humans and animals are known as zoonoses. It has been estimated that 70% of emerging infectious diseases of humans are zoonoses. The area of medicine devoted to this topic is known as veterinary public health (VPH). It is our intention to adapt the tools developed by the Cochrane Collaboration to this field.
Objectives:
1. To examine the extent to which systematic reviews have been applied in VPH.
2. To assess the potential interest of policy groups in supporting the application of this tool in the field of VPH.
3. To evaluate the applicability of Cochrane-style systematic reviews in topic areas relevant to VPH.
Methods:
1. Medline, Current Contents, Agricola and CAB databases and the Internet were searched for published systematic reviews in the field of VPH.
2. Provincial and federal policy groups as well as food animal commodity groups were approached for funding through direct contact and response to 'Requests for Proposals'.
3. Cochrane-style systematic review protocols were adapted and applied to several issues in the field of VPH and food safety using the Electronic Systematic Review (ESR) platform.
Results:
1. Systematic reviews have been used to a very limited extent in food safety and VPH.
2. Policy groups approached were very keen to support work in this area and funded multiple projects.
3. Cochrane-style reviews in VPH encounter similar challenges to those in the field of health promotion and public health including lack of randomized control trials, heterogeneity of available studies, etc. In addition, methodological quality issues unique to this field (eg. confounding due to herd size) required adaptations to existing protocols.
Conclusions: Systematic reviews are an untapped resource in the field of VPH that can provide a powerful and transparent tool to enable policy makers to produce evidence-based summaries and policy guidelines and to select optimal intervention strategies in the field of VPH.
Objectives:
1. To examine the extent to which systematic reviews have been applied in VPH.
2. To assess the potential interest of policy groups in supporting the application of this tool in the field of VPH.
3. To evaluate the applicability of Cochrane-style systematic reviews in topic areas relevant to VPH.
Methods:
1. Medline, Current Contents, Agricola and CAB databases and the Internet were searched for published systematic reviews in the field of VPH.
2. Provincial and federal policy groups as well as food animal commodity groups were approached for funding through direct contact and response to 'Requests for Proposals'.
3. Cochrane-style systematic review protocols were adapted and applied to several issues in the field of VPH and food safety using the Electronic Systematic Review (ESR) platform.
Results:
1. Systematic reviews have been used to a very limited extent in food safety and VPH.
2. Policy groups approached were very keen to support work in this area and funded multiple projects.
3. Cochrane-style reviews in VPH encounter similar challenges to those in the field of health promotion and public health including lack of randomized control trials, heterogeneity of available studies, etc. In addition, methodological quality issues unique to this field (eg. confounding due to herd size) required adaptations to existing protocols.
Conclusions: Systematic reviews are an untapped resource in the field of VPH that can provide a powerful and transparent tool to enable policy makers to produce evidence-based summaries and policy guidelines and to select optimal intervention strategies in the field of VPH.