The Canadian Cochrane Centre is starting a new blog which will feature a contribution from a different person/group each month. Do you have a burning desire to voice your opinion on a health-related issue? Has something happened in the world of health that you think deserves some attention? We’d love to hear from you about items like this and more! Contact the editor, Lori Tarbett, at ltarbett@ohri.ca with your ideas. Anyone is welcome to contribute.

We would like to introduce you to our Partner Resource Menu. We have a resource for just about any Cochrane need. Visit the Resource Menu where you will find a variety of tools ranging from Cochrane Review evidence to online learning opportunities.   

The Globe and Mail published an article on 18 February 2014 about salt intake in which the author, John Sloan, a practicing family physician and a clinical professor, writes, “The world-famous evidence evaluator, the Cochrane Collaboration, has done the two best meta-analyses on the subject.”Sloan concludes, “The scientific bottom line is clear: cutting back salt has not been shown to make any real difference to health outcomes. Could it be time to bring back the salt shaker to the table?”

Writing in the journal Nature, two leaders of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) have commended the clinical trials community for taking “important steps towards adopting standard reporting elements” developed by Dr David Moher and his colleagues (called the CONSORT statement). The commentary, written by Drs Francis Collins and Lawrence Tabak, outlines the NIH’s efforts to enhance the reproducibility of preclinical research.

The National Eating Disorder Information Centre (NEDIC) has recently refreshed its Cochrane Corner.

We are delighted to announce the establishment of the Portuguese Branch of the Iberoamerican Cochrane Centre and the Japanese Branch of the Australasian Cochrane Centre.The Portuguese Branch will be based out of the Faculties of Medicine at the University of Lisbon and the University of Porto. The main base of the Japanese Branch will be at the National Center for Child Health and Development (NCCHD) in Tokyo.

Tourism Quebec, the Centre des congrès de Québec, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Quebec and Québec International honored 15 members of the ambassadors Circle on 17 January 2013.Drs France Légaré and François Rousseau, Co-Chairs of the 2013 Colloquium (along with Dr Jeremy Grimshaw) were awarded the Event of the Year award in for the 2013 International Cochrane Colloquium. The event attracted 923 participants at the Centre des congrès de Québec in September and generated tourism spending of around $1.9 million in the region.

Drs David Moher and George Wells have been recognized in a new list of the top 400 biomedical researchers in the world (out of a total of 15 million researchers identified). The list, published in the European Journal of Clinical Investigation, includes researchers who have more than 25,000 citations or an h-index of 76 or more (based on data from the last 15 years).

The Bodleian Library recently published a book titled, Great Medical Discoveries, An Oxford Story to coincide with its exhibition of the same name. The exhibition tells the story of Oxford's place in the history of medicine from the medieval period to its current position at the forefront of medical research and clinical practice. The Cochrane Collaboration is prominently featured within the book. Find out more about Great Medical Discoveries, An Oxford Story here.

The Cochrane Collaboration has formed a partnership with Wikipedia via the Wiki Project Med Foundation to promote the use of independent, high-quality evidence in Wikipedia articles. Wikipedia’s impact and global reach easily surpass all other knowledge resources in the world today, providing an unparalleled opportunity for Cochrane to reach new audiences.