Usage of Cochrane reviews in The World Health Organization (WHO) Reproductive Health Library

Article type
Authors
Dooley G, Bassett P, Gülmezoglu M, Stancliffe R, Starr M
Abstract
Background: The WHO Reproductive Health Library (RHL) has included Cochrane reviews since 1997. RHL adds value to Cochrane reviews by contextualising them for under-resourced settings with independently authored commentaries and practical aspects organised as 'packages' of information. Commentaries are shown by default and the user may click to view a review abstract then click again to view the complete review.

Objectives: Our objectives were to evaluate the number of times users of RHL, having seen the commentaries by default, click through to abstracts of reviews and subsequently click through from abstracts to the complete reviews.

Methods: We analysed the usage figures for the internet version of RHL between April 2005 and February 2006. We extracted the number of times abstracts of Cochrane reviews and full Cochrane reviews were accessed over that period and compared the results.

Results: From 10,592 views of packages there were 1,538 (14.5%) click throughs to the associated abstracts of Cochrane reviews. Of those click throughs, there were a further 982 (63.8%) click throughs to the complete reviews. This represents a click through rate from package to full review of 9.3%.

Conclusions: When presented with a summary of evidence contextualised for their setting it appears that users click through to the source abstracts relatively few times (14.5%) and to the full reviews fewer still (9.3%). However, the majority of users who looked at an abstract of a Cochrane review subsequently went on to look at the full review. This poster examines possible explanations and offers further detailed analyses of user behaviour in relation to Cochrane reviews in the context of RHL.