Article type
Year
Abstract
Background: There is increased interest around women’s involvement in the Cochrane Collaboration (CC). Broader participation is one of the principles of the Collaboration and increasing women’s involvement is one way to achieve this goal.
Objectives: We aimed to determine the facilitators who are based in or hail from developing countries (DC), who facilitate women getting involved with the Collaboration.
Methods: We developed a questionnaire and used snowball sampling to survey women from developing countries involved in the Cochrane Collaboration.
Results: Nine women responded to our survey. They were from Iran, Bangladesh, USA, Argentina and Uganda and are based in the UK, USA, Bangladesh, Uganda and Iran. All of them were authors of Cochrane reviews. Other roles that they have filled were: centre staff, handsearcher, and referees. They have been involved with the CC two to six years. Only one of them had an influential role in the CC; however, the rest would be interested in taking a more influential role in the CC. They became involved either through a local initiative or another Cochrane contributor. The factors they saw as facilitating greater women involvement included:(a) Increasing opportunities for women to participate and network (e.g. engaging them in review teams with more equal treatment)(b) Scholarship for women to attend the Colloquium and other relevant events(c) Increasing training opportunities(d) Providing opportunities at a local level and building toward wider participation.(e) More long term and sustainable funding opportunities in developing countries.
Conclusions: This pilot study provides a picture of the view of women from developing countries who are widely involved in the Cochrane Collaboration. We recommend that the Collaboration would more strategically involve these women in planning wider participation in the Cochrane collaboration. We will report the results from other women who will respond in October 2011.
Objectives: We aimed to determine the facilitators who are based in or hail from developing countries (DC), who facilitate women getting involved with the Collaboration.
Methods: We developed a questionnaire and used snowball sampling to survey women from developing countries involved in the Cochrane Collaboration.
Results: Nine women responded to our survey. They were from Iran, Bangladesh, USA, Argentina and Uganda and are based in the UK, USA, Bangladesh, Uganda and Iran. All of them were authors of Cochrane reviews. Other roles that they have filled were: centre staff, handsearcher, and referees. They have been involved with the CC two to six years. Only one of them had an influential role in the CC; however, the rest would be interested in taking a more influential role in the CC. They became involved either through a local initiative or another Cochrane contributor. The factors they saw as facilitating greater women involvement included:(a) Increasing opportunities for women to participate and network (e.g. engaging them in review teams with more equal treatment)(b) Scholarship for women to attend the Colloquium and other relevant events(c) Increasing training opportunities(d) Providing opportunities at a local level and building toward wider participation.(e) More long term and sustainable funding opportunities in developing countries.
Conclusions: This pilot study provides a picture of the view of women from developing countries who are widely involved in the Cochrane Collaboration. We recommend that the Collaboration would more strategically involve these women in planning wider participation in the Cochrane collaboration. We will report the results from other women who will respond in October 2011.