Health systems and individuals in Ireland will benefit from the appointment of a new leader for Cochrane Ireland - a venture which will actively promote the use of the best available research evidence to inform decision-making about health.
This new initiative will build on the excellent work achieved already by Cochrane* locally. The initiative is being funded by the Health Research Board and HSC Research & Development Division, Public Health Agency, Northern Ireland and supported by the UK Cochrane Centre.
To progress the initiative, Dr Dónal O’Mathúna**, has just been appointed as Convenor of Cochrane Ireland and Associate Director of the UK Cochrane Centre.
'Cochrane is a highly regarded international organisation with a reputation for producing high-quality credible information to help patients and professionals with both ordinary and difficult health care decisions', says Dr O’Mathúna. 'My aim is to ensure that Cochrane Ireland makes a practical contribution to the health and social care systems across the Island of Ireland'.
*The Cochrane Collaboration is a global independent network of health practitioners, researchers, patient advocates and others, responding to the challenge of making vast amounts of evidence generated through research available in meaningful ways to inform decisions about health.
**Senior Lecturer in Ethics, Decision-Making and Evidence, in the School of Nursing and Human Sciences at Dublin City University. Dónal is also an experienced Cochrane author and trainer. He will take up this new post as a part-time secondment for three years.
