The NCTR is affiliated to the Australasian Cochrane Centre which is responsible for the coordination of Australasia's involvement in the Cochrane Collaboration, an international organisation of health professionals and consumers which aims to prepare and maintain systematic reviews of the effectiveness of health care, and to make this information widely available, thereby influencing decisions about health care provision and practice. There are thousands of journals which publish the results of medical research. It is clearly not possible for individuals to read and keep up with all of the available literature, hence the value of the review article which summarises currently available knowledge into a single, easily digestible form. Unfortunately many reviews do not approach the task in a scientific fashion and are therefore susceptible to bias and the interpretations of the reviewer. Systematic reviews state the methods of data collection, inclusion, critical appraisal and analysis in a review protocol written before the review commences, and attempt to identify and synthesise all of the available evidence, including unpublished trials.
Registered information be potentially accessible by all interested parties.
Prospective registration of trials should be part of Ethical Guidelines for Trials. The group aims to ensure consistency and compatability of data collected across registries, and is working on appropriate methods of coding and classifying trial information. Watch this space for further details. Contact the Coordinator for further information. The Registry Coordinator is currently working on the first draft of the first NCTR Annual Report and it is hoped to that a final version will be available early in 1996.