Twenty Cochrane Skin Group members from six countries gathered for our meeting in London last month. We heard from Mónica Paola Novoa from Colombia about the targeted updates on infantile haemangioma, while Esther van Zuuren from the Netherlands took us through a workshop on Summary of Findings tables. We had a round table discussion on the interface between CSG reviews and guidelines, with views from different countries as well as input from two people from the BAD. Sally Wilkes shared her findings from mapping a network of trials of treatments for atopic eczema, showing a shortage of head-to-head trials and high levels of industry funding. Jan Kottner from Germany updated us on the progress of CSG-COUSIN, and we found out about evidence based medicine in Taiwan from our editor Ching-Chi Chi. Matthew Grainge and Jo Leonardi-Bee introduced us to Trial Sequential Analysis (a methodology that combines cumulated sample sizes of all included trials for a meta-analysis with the threshold of statistical significance) and we discussed whether it could be used for Cochrane reviews, for example to assess whether an update is necessary. The meeting closed with a useful discussion on consumer involvement with insight from three consumers on their experiences.
One of our author's, Maxine Whitton, has prepared a podcast for Trials Change Lives. Since the beginning, the importance of involving people with the condition has been a well-recognised component in ensuring that Cochrane Reviews are relevant to decision makers. Listen to her recording at http://www.cochrane.org/ICT-day-2015/a-patients-story
RevMan tutorial videos
Did you know that there are a series of short RevMan tutorial videos available? They are currently hosted on YouTube here. These useful videos were produced by Jun Xia at the Cochrane Schizophrenia Group.
They have also been translated and are available for Chinese-speaking reviewers on the Review Solutions website. There is a symbolic charge of £1.60 for the whole 'getting started series', which contains 9 video clips. The fee is not for profit making, but rather for making the video and site sustainable by covering the server costs for hosting the videos.
Recently published reviews
Schlager JG, Rosumeck S, Werner RN, Jacobs A, Schmitt J, Schlager C, Nast A. Topical treatments for scalp psoriasis. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2016, Issue 2. Art. No.: CD009687. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD009687.pub2.
Tam H, Calderon MA, Manikam L, Nankervis H, García Núñez I, Williams HC, Durham S, Boyle RJ. Specific allergen immunotherapy for the treatment of atopic eczema.Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews 2016, Issue 2. Art. No.: CD008774. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD008774.pub2.
