Can we achieve 'Health Information for All by 2015'?
introduction to the Global Review Steering Group

Najeeb Al-Shorbaji is Regional Advisor for Health Information at the WHO Eastern Mediterranean Regional Office. The review fits within the core functions of WHO as a knowledge-based organization. Issues to be addressed in the review include: (1) An audit/inventory of what the international community has done to promote and strengthen health information support in developing countries; (2) Critical analysis of the impact of the work of the international community in support of health information in developing countries; and (3) How relevant is the work done and how receptive are developing countries? WHO/EMRO's role in the review is to present the work done in the Eastern Mediterranean Region, showing cases, projects and lessons learnt over the last 10 years.

Rana Jawad Asghar is the coordinator of the South Asian Public Health Forum and will facilitate the Global Review in this region. South Asia is a region where on the one hand technology is most advanced and on the other hand nearly 50% of its kids are malnourished, and 40% of its population live on less than US$1 per day. It is thus important to find innovative but affordable and effective techniques to deliver health information in this region. SAPHF was established in 1999 and is an active online forum for South Asian public health professionals, and will elicit the opinions and needs of the majority of health professionals in this region whose voices are not usually heard. Jawad has more than a decade of international public health experience in Asia, Africa, Europe, and America. He is interested in newer technologies to disseminate health information more effectively and efficiently in developing countries. He has just finished working on a child survival project in Mozambique, and previously worked as a faculty member at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and for Stanford University as a Research Associate in the Division of Infectious Diseases and Geographic Medicine. He has also worked as a consultant for various organizations and governments, and has been selected as an Epidemic Intelligence Service Officer at Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), USA.

Ibrahima Bob is president of AHILA, the Association for Health Information and Libraries in Africa. He also works at Africa Consultants International, an American Dakar based NGO in Senegal specialising in communication for development. His professional interests include improving access to information in developing countries, Internet training, and information resources for developing countries. Ibrahima Bob is also the Francophone West Africa Regional coordinator for the Open Knowledge network (OKN) an initiative of the DOTForce: the Digital Opportunity Task Force set up by the G8 Heads of State to make a decisive contribution to bridging the digital divide.

Paul Chinnock represents The Cochrane Collaboration, an international initiative dedicated to improving healthcare for the world's population. It helps people make well-informed decisions about healthcare by preparing, maintaining and promoting the accessibility of Cochrane systematic reviews of the effects of healthcare interventions. Systematic reviews bring together research on the effects of healthcare and are considered the gold standard for determining the relative effectiveness of different interventions. The Collaboration is the world's leading producer of these reviews, which are of direct relevance to clinicians, patients and their representatives, policy makers, health commentators, and others. The Collaboration thus plays a pivotal role in the production and dissemination of research evidence across all areas of healthcare. The Global Review will help the Collaboration to target relevant information to those who need it, to improve the ways in which this is done, and to ensure that its work proceeds as part of a coordinated global effort. Paul Chinnock's background includes work in Africa as a teacher and as a nutritionist. He has been Editor of several journals of continuing medical education aimed specifically at developing countries; these include Medicine Digest, Africa Health, and Caribbean Health. He has worked as a consultant editor and writer for several organisations, including the World Health Organization, the UK Department for International Development, the Panos Institute, and Healthlink Worldwide.

Bruce Dahlman is Medical Director at Kijabe Hospital, Kenya and local Programme Coordinator for the Master of Medicine Family Health programme in collaboration with Moi University Faculty of Health Sciences in Eldoret and four other rural hospitals. The challenge remains to develop a learner-centered, distributive education model with innovative access to medical knowledge database resources and interactive conferencing between sites in an infrastructure-poor setting. He also serves on the Executive Committee of the Kenya Association of Family Physicians that is introducing practice-based small groups for continuing professional development throughout Kenya.

Jennifer DePasquale is the Information Resource Manager/Scientific and Medical Editor/Communications for Better Health® Program Coordinator for the Dreyfus Health Foundation (DHF), New York, USA. The DHF’s Communications for Better Health® Program has the specific aim of improving accessibility to practical, basic health information that can be used to problem solve in the developing world. Both paper and electronic means of information dissemination are used as appropriate. Communications for Better Health® Programs are established in the following 14 countries: Belarus, Bulgaria, Cameroon, El Salvador, Ghana, Guyana, Jordan, Mali, Nigeria, Romania, Tanzania, Uganda, Ukraine, and Zambia. DHF's Communications for Better Health® Country Coordinators could provide very valuable input and insights into the Global Review. The African Communications for Better Health® Coordinators will attend the AHILA Congress in Malawi in October 2004, and will contribute individual country program evaluations during the Global Review stream of the meeting, providing a review of progress, lessons learned, and ways forward in the “local production and exchange of health learning materials.” Communications for Better Health® Coordinators from Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Central America, and South America will also provide country-level input for the Global Review.

John Evans is manager of publishing and bookselling at the University of Papua New Guinea. He is also adviser at the Papua New Guinea National HIV/AIDS Support Project. The project is aiming to place print and CDROM health collections at all hospitals, nurse training institutions, research institutions, universities, relevant NGOs, teacher training and functioning public libraries as well as national and provincial AIDS offices in Papua New Guinea. John Evans will coordinate the Western Pacific region component for the Global Review on Access to Health Information, with a particular focus on Papua New Guinea and information literacy. A major national health meeting is planned for Papua New Guinea in November 2004. John Evans aims to ensure that space is allocated at the meeting for a presentation and discussion on progress/lessons-learned/ways forward for health information access in Papua New Guinea.

Fiona Godlee is Head of BMJ Knowledge and Editor of Clinical Evidence. She trained in general medicine and was previously an editor on the BMJ, president of the World Association of Medical Editors, and Editorial Director of the open access publisher, BioMed Central. She authored, with Neil Pakenham-Walsh and others, a discussion paper commissioned by WHO on access to information for health professionals in the developing world, which calls for universal access to essential healthcare information by 2015. A version of this paper will be published in the July 17-23 issue of The Lancet (currently freely available early online at www.thelancet.com) as part of the launch of the Global Review.

Jane Hogg/The Wellcome Trust. The Wellcome Trust is an independent research-funding charity. Its mission is to “foster and promote research with the aim of improving human and animal health.” It is committed, through its International Programmes, to supporting research into the major diseases affecting the developing and restructuring world and to building research capacity in these regions. The Trust has a fundamental interest in the availability and accessibility of research and supports open and unrestricted access to the published output of research.  The Trust’s particular interest within the global review is in encouraging the exploration of objective information on the impact of open access publishing on journals, researchers, and other users of biomedical research in developing countries, enabling the Trust to take forward its commitment to open access for the greatest benefit.

Susan Jupp is the Head of Communications and Information at the Geneva-based Global Forum for Health Research. The Global Forum for Health Research is an independent international foundation promoting more health research to combat the neglected diseases and conditions that are major sources of ill health in developing countries. Since its establishment in 1998, the Global Forum has worked to draw attention to the “10/90 gap”: the estimation that less than 10% of global resources for health research are spent each year on addressing 90% of the world’s health problems. In 2004, the Global Forum is particularly looking at the health research necessary to achieve the Millennium Development Goals; the theme of the two major meetings that will take place in Mexico City from 16 to 20 November 2004: the Global Forum’s 2004 annual meeting, Forum 8, and the Ministerial Summit on Health Research organized by WHO and the Mexican Ministry of Health. Space has been reserved in Forum 8 for a presentation of the Global Review and discussion of progress, lessons learned, and ways forward for health information access.

Bruce Madge is representing the Medical Library Association. Founded on May 2, 1898, by four librarians and four physicians, the Medical Library Association (MLA) is the second oldest special library association in the United States. MLA is dedicated to improving excellence and leadership of the health information professional to foster the art and science of health information services. We further the professional development of our members through career information resources, meetings, publications, courses, awards, scholarships, and various support services. As one of her priorities, 2003/04 President Pat Thibodeau, set up the Task Force for Global Initiatives with the following remit: a. Explore and define global partnerships and initiatives that strengthen access to health information and the quality of care across the world. b. Identify and recognize those members and units of MLA who have built international partnerships, programs and opportunities. c. Build bridges with publishers, associations, societies and others involved in developing and distributing biomedical information. d. Advocate MLA’s and MLA members’ potential as collaborators and partners, in light of globalization and its impacts on health care understanding and delivery. e. Monitor and respond to federal and national legislation that impacts access to health care information for the professional, consumer and society. In 2004, MLA nominated Bruce Madge, Research Manager at the National Patient Safety Agency and member of the Task Force, as their representative on the steering group of the Global Review.

Harry McConnell is a Neurologist and Director of the Interactive Health Network, non-profit organisation using information and communication technologies to address health inequities in developing countries. The Interactive Health Network is focused on critical issues in global health including HIV, malaria, and tuberculosis and uses a variety of innovative networks to achieve dialogues between policy makers and health care providers in Africa, Asia, the Pacific and Latin America. Dr McConnell has worked extensively with many eLearning and health communications technologies in resource-poor settings and specialises in reaching remote areas for health information and interactive dialogues in critical topics for development.

Pascal Mouhouelo is Reference Librarian at the World Health Organization Africa Regional Office, Brazzaville, Congo. He was involved in the African Index Medicus (AIM)Project and is one of the WHO facilitators in charge of
training in the use of the Blue Trunk Libraries (BTL) in health Districts. He has already trained BTL Managers in Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Comoros, D. R. Congo, Ethiopia, Mauritania, Rwanda, Uganda and Senegal.
Pascal Mouhouelo is the moderator of AHILA-net, a discussion list for AHILA members and partners. He has also contributed to the creation of the AFROLIB database (afrolib.afro.who.int) 

Abel Packer is director of the Latin American and Caribbean Centre on Health Sciences Information (generally known as BIREME, from its original name Biblioteca Regional de Medicina). BIREME is an international organization that aims to improve the access of Latin American & Caribbean health professionals to the best available health literature, and to facilitate the dissemination and application of Latin American health science research. BIREME/PAHO/WHO will provide the following contributions to the Global review: (1) South to South collaboration:  Virtual Health Library methodologies, technologies and information sources are suitable to cooperative environments with infrastructure under development. BIREME is open to transfer the VHL model or any of its components. (2) Development of a network of open access journals. SciELO methodology should contribute to the electronic publication of selected quality journals from developing countries. (3) Promotion of a network of indicators of usage, quality and impact of health scientific information

Neil Pakenham-Walsh has a background in medicine and medical publishing, including work with the World Health Organization, the journal Medicine Digest, and the CD-ROM series Topics in International Health (Wellcome Trust). He has worked as a medical officer in rural Ecuador and Peru. He currently runs the INASP-Health programme (International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications), which aims to support cooperation, analysis, and advocacy among those working to improve access to reliable information for health professionals in developing and transitional countries. Neil will facilitate the Global Review.

Sarah Ramsay has been a senior editor at The Lancet medical journal for the past 12 years and has a particular interest in communication and developing-world health. She is coordinating a series of articles that will review the evidence on issues such as how to develop more equitable health systems, sustainable financing, human-resource development, promotion of quality, how to integrate vertical disease-specific programs into health systems, and how to scale up effective interventions. The series will be published in The Lancet in the weeks leading up to the Ministerial Summit on Health Research, which will be held in Mexico City in mid-November. Sarah will also be participating in the African Medical Editors Partnership, which is being coordinated by the Council of Scientific Editors and funded initially by the funded by the US National Library of Medicine and the Fogarty International Center.

Lenny Rhine. One of the goals of The International Cooperation Section (ICS) of the Medical Library Association, USA is to provide opportunities for participation in international cooperation projects.  Since 1973, the section has coordinated the Cunningham Memorial International Fellowship that trains international medical librarians in North America.  From 2001-04, the section developed library partnerships to the Medical Research Library of Latvia and the Holberton Hospital Medical Library in St John’s, Antigua.  In May 2004, a Committee for Health Sciences Library Partnerships was organized to facilitate and foster such relationships. The committee is interested in the Global Review so that we can better facilitate these exchanges and collaborate with similar organizations such as the UK based Partnerships In Health Information (PHI). Besides being the representative for the ICS and a member of the Steering Group, Lenny Rhine is also the co-compiler of the INASP Health Library Partnership Database and will be making a brief presentation about such programs.  Jean Shaw (PHI) and Lenny Rhine are responsible for the section of the Review that pertains to these projects.  As the compiler of the INASP Health Links gateway, Lenny is also interested in any aspects of this process that will enhance this project and facilitate use of the website.

James Tumwine is chair of FAME, the Forum for African Medical Editors. FAME is a network of editors formed to contribute to development in Sub Saharan Africa, through publication and timely dissemination of quality health and development information and research. James is also founder editor of African Health Sciences - Africa's latest MEDLINE-indexed journal of health and development. FAME will contribute to the Global Review through international meetings in Uganda, Kenya, Mali, and Malawi.

Hans van der Slikke has been practicing in obstetrics and gynaecology for more than 25 years. He is a member of the faculty of the Department of Gynaecology, Vrije Universiteit Medical Centre, Amsterdam. For more than six years he has been the Chairman of the International Council for OBGYN-net (http://www.obgyn.net), the global gateway for obstetrics, gynaecology and women’s health. He is associate editor (http://www.jmir.org/editors.htm) of the open–access Journal of Medical Internet Research and Board Member of the Internet Health Coalition (http://www.ihealthcoalition.org). Since November 2000 Hans van der Slikke has been the Chairman of the Society for the Internet in Medicine (http://www.internet-in-medicine.org/), the organisation that organizes the yearly MEDNET conference. During the next MEDNET conference a special session will be devoted to access to medical information.

Chris Zielinski spent over 20 years as a publisher in WHO and FAO, working in Africa, Asia, and Europe. Chris is Principal Consultant of Informania Ltd, the company he originally founded in 1992 to produce ExtraMED, a database that presents the full text and images of over 300 Third World biomedical journals on a monthly CD-ROM. He is currently Director of the Health Information for Development Project, the projected first phase of the Information Waystations and Staging Posts project, which seeks to build the technological capacity of some 1000 health information resource centres and develop selected centres into large-scale producers of locally appropriate health information. Chris serves on the board of Healthlink Worldwide. He is currently based at WHO Geneva where he is working with The Alliance on Health Policy and Systems Research. The Alliance is an initiative of the Global Forum for Health Research and is centrally involved in the Global Forum for Health Research/World Summit on Health Research, Mexico, November 2004.