The ExME initiative: a two-year experience in Knowledge Translation among Spanish-speaking students

Article type
Authors
Meza N1, Fuentes R2, Ardiles S3, Casino G4, Pizarro AB5, Gomez-Puig J3, Romero-Robles M3, Ortiz-Munoz L6, Chahín N7, Andrenacci P8, Viteri-Garcia A9, Urrutia G4
1Interdisciplinary Centre for Health Studies (CIESAL), Universidad de Valparaíso, Valparaiso, Chile
2Departamento de Ciencias de la Rehabilitación, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad de La Frontera, Temuco, Chile.
3Estudiantes por la Mejor Evidencia (ExME), Iberoamerican Cochrane Centre, Barcelona, Spain
4Biomedical Research Institute Sant Pau (IIB Sant Pau), CIBER Epidemiología y Salud Pública (CIBERESP), Iberoamerican Cochrane Centre, Barcelona, Spain
5Clinical Research Center, Fundación Valle del Lili, Cali, Colombia
6UC Evidence Center, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile
7Facultad de Medicina y Ciencias de la Salud, Universidad Mayor, Temuco, Chile
8Cochrane US Mentoring Program
9Centro de Investigación de Salud Pública y Epidemiología Clínica (CISPEC), Universidad UTE. Quito, Ecuador
Abstract
Background: Exchange Made Easy Club (ExME) is the Spanish homologous to the Students 4 Best Evidence (S4BE) Cochrane UK project, supported by Cochrane Iberoamerica. We planned this platform after identifying the need to make this type of resource available in Spanish due to language barriers common in many non-native English-speaking countries. Since 2020, we have arranged this initiative with the aim to encourage students to produce, translate, and disseminate content related to the best evidence in health sciences. ExME allows establishment of a link with Cochrane Collaboration by starting to collect Cochrane Membership points. The platform has been hosted as a blog website to help students share content pursuing better clinical practice through reasonable and informed-health decisions.

Objectives: To describe the type of content published.

Methods: We formed an organising committee with students and scholars from seven different Spanish-speaking countries, deployed in a translations team; a new content team; a reviewers team; a communications team; and a technical support team. After registration and receiving instructions, undergraduate or postgraduate students are invited to propose a topic of interest to write about, to be addressed by the following: writing de novo blog entries or translating content published by S4BE. Then, the collaborators must submit their drafts to a review process conducted by an experienced scholar linked to the Iberoamerica Cochrane Network and respond following the suggestions and making the amendments before the final publication. After being published, blog entries are disseminated via social media.

Results: At the moment, we have published and disseminated 65 blog entries (27 new content and 38 translations) elaborated by collaborators from 10 different countries along Latin America and Spain. In parallel, the organising committee has reached agreements with four institutions (universities and research centres) to include ExME (as a supplementary material repository or a curricular activity by generating blog entries) in their educational programs, whereas we are in conversations with other interested stakeholders to expand the project.

Conclusions: We expect that more students and professors of health-related sciences will consider ExME as a platform to share useful and entrusted information.

Patient, public, and/or healthcare consumer involvement: This project does not involve direct participation of patients or consumers.