§ Mr. Matthew TaylorTo ask the Secretary of State for Health how many series of research papers his Department produces; and what are the names of each of these series of research papers. [62051]
§ Ms JowellThe Department takes a number of steps to ensure that the research it supports is widely disseminated
The National Health Service research and development health technology assessment programme produces a series of monographs reporting on research findings from projects that it has commissioned. This series called "Health Technology Assessment", is indexed in MEDLINE and EMBASE. The NHS Centre for Reviews and Dissemination and the University of York produce a series of systematic reviews of research. Both of these are funded by the Department.Other Departmental/NHS research and development programmes produce special publications when the need arises. These cover individual projects or more general themes.The Department actively encourages all of the researchers it funds to publish their findings in peer reviewed journals.The Department places particular emphasis on reviews of research and on producing accessible databases of research outputs. The Department funds the Centre for Reviews and Dissemination to produce the Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effectiveness (DARE), which is available on the Internet. The Department also funds the UK Cochrane Centre (which is a major contributor to the international Cochrane Collaboration). The "Cochrane Library", which is available on CD Rom, contains the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.The White Paper "The New NHS" undertook to make research findings from the NHS research and development programme available in a user-friendly format. We are now considering how this can be done and how all of the above can be brought together via the new national electronic library for health.