Global Library of Women's Medicine

Last updated

Global Library of Women's Medicine
ProducerThe Foundation for The Global Library of Women’s Medicine
History2008-present
Access
Cost Open access
Coverage
Disciplines Women's health
Print edition
ISSN 1756-2228
Links
Website www.glowm.com

The Global Library of Women's Medicine is a free and publicly available resource of clinical information on women's health launched on 20 November 2008. [1] [2] Its purpose is to provide expert support to obstetricians, gynecologists, and reproductive health professionals.[ citation needed ]

Contents

The site is contributed to by over 750 specialists and its main feature is a large and continually growing library of specially commissioned chapters on most aspects of women's medicine, constantly reviewed and updated. This has recently been supported by the introduction of an online Learning Assessment option, providing Certificates of Study Completion plus Continuing Professional Development awards (from FIGO – International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics) for those who undertake this assessment successfully [3]

The site also includes an extensive section on Safer Motherhood providing practical guidance for nurses, midwives and other healthcare workers and it offers a free Safer Motherhood app so that these resources can accompany care providers during their daily work. Whilst the resources provided by The Global Library are designed to be relevant everywhere, there is an additional special focus on the needs of LMICs.[ citation needed ]

The Global Library is run as a not-for-profit undertaking and it accepts no advertising or commercial sponsorship; its income is dependent on personal donations and unrestricted educational grants.[ citation needed ]

The editor-in-chief is Peter von Dadelszen, Professor of Global Women's Health, King's College London.

The website has been certified to be "fully compliant with the HONcode standard for trustworthy health information" by the Health On the Net Foundation. [4]

Welfare of Women

The Welfare of Women global health programme is a new initiative by The Global Library of Women's Medicine and is an attempt to try and provide health professionals globally with immediate access to the latest, state-of-the-art, information on women's health and on the 'best practice' management of relevant clinical conditions.[ citation needed ]

In particular the programme tries to address the main factors that have, in the past, often limited the effective transmission of such information to those who need it most by using a range of new technologies and approaches in a carefully integrated manner.  The factors addressed include language (the programme is multi-lingual), distribution (using the internet AND mobile phone technologies combined to maximise coverage, interactivity (offering options for reader interaction – not just passive study, outreach (global distribution, assisted by local networks and national  Societies, adaptability (continuous updating, adaptation and extension) and focus (provided at three separate levels to meet differing needs of readers.[ citation needed ]

In this way it is hoped that this programme may make a modest but practical contribution to the work of many dedicated healthcare professionals around the world.[ citation needed ]

Related Research Articles

Obstetrics and gynaecology is the medical specialty that encompasses the two subspecialties of obstetrics and gynaecology. The specialization is an important part of care for women's health.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pharmacist</span> Healthcare professional

A pharmacist is a healthcare professional who specializes in the preparation, dispensing, and management of medications and who provides pharmaceutical advice and guidance. Pharmacists often serve as primary care providers in the community, and may offer other services such as health screenings and immunizations.

In the medical profession, a general practitioner (GP) or family physician is a physician who treats acute and chronic illnesses and provides preventive care and health education to patients of all ages. GPs' duties are not confined to specific fields of medicine, and they have particular skills in treating people with multiple health issues. They are trained to treat patients to levels of complexity that vary between countries. The term "primary care physician" is more usually used in the US. In Asian countries like India, this term has been replaced mainly by Medical Officers, Registered Medical Practitioner etc.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cochrane Library</span> Collection of databases in medicine and other healthcare specialties

The Cochrane Library is a collection of databases in medicine and other healthcare specialties provided by Cochrane and other organizations. At its core is the collection of Cochrane Reviews, a database of systematic reviews and meta-analyses which summarize and interpret the results of medical research. The Cochrane Library aims to make the results of well-conducted controlled trials readily available and is a key resource in evidence-based medicine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Health On the Net Foundation</span> Nonprofit organization that certifies online medical information

Health On the Net Foundation (HON) is a Swiss not-for-profit organization based in Geneva which promotes a code of conduct for websites providing health information and offers certificates to those in compliance.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Health informatics</span> Computational approaches to health care

Health informatics is the study and implementation of computer structures and algorithms to improve communication, understanding, and management of medical information. It can be viewed as branch of engineering and applied science.

Pharmacovigilance, also known as drug safety, is the pharmaceutical science relating to the "collection, detection, assessment, monitoring, and prevention" of adverse effects with pharmaceutical products. The etymological roots for the word "pharmacovigilance" are: pharmakon and vigilare. As such, pharmacovigilance heavily focuses on adverse drug reactions (ADR), which are defined as any response to a drug which is noxious and unintended, including lack of efficacy. Medication errors such as overdose, and misuse and abuse of a drug as well as drug exposure during pregnancy and breastfeeding, are also of interest, even without an adverse event, because they may result in an adverse drug reaction.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics</span> Professional medical organization

The International Federation of Gynaecology and Obstetrics, usually just FIGO ("fee'go") as the acronym of its French name Fédération Internationale de Gynécologie et d'Obstétrique, is a worldwide non-governmental organisation representing obstetricians and gynaecologists in over one hundred territories. It was founded on 26 July 1954 in Geneva, Switzerland, to "promote the well-being of women and to raise the standard of practice in obstetrics and gynaecology". Membership is currently composed of 132 professional societies of obstetricians and gynaecologists worldwide.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Medical laboratory scientist</span> Medical professional who works in the laboratory

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Clinical engineering is a specialty within biomedical engineering responsible for using medical technology to optimize healthcare delivery.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Health literacy</span> Ability to understand healthcare information

Health literacy is the ability to obtain, read, understand, and use healthcare information in order to make appropriate health decisions and follow instructions for treatment. There are multiple definitions of health literacy, in part, because health literacy involves both the context in which health literacy demands are made and the skills that people bring to that situation.

The Centre for Reviews and Dissemination (CRD) is a health services research centre based at the University of York, England. CRD was established in January 1994, and aims to provide research-based information for evidence-based medicine. CRD carries out systematic reviews and meta-analyses of healthcare interventions, and disseminates the results of research to decision-makers in the NHS.

Due to the near-universal desire for safe and good quality healthcare, there is a growing interest in international healthcare accreditation. Providing healthcare, especially of an adequate standard, is a complex and challenging process. Healthcare is a vital and emotive issue—its importance pervades all aspects of societies, and it has medical, social, political, ethical, business, and financial ramifications. In any part of the world healthcare services can be provided either by the public sector or by the private sector, or by a combination of both, and the site of delivery of healthcare can be located in hospitals or be accessed through practitioners working in the community, such as general medical practitioners and dental surgeons.

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The National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) is the British government’s major funder of clinical, public health, social care and translational research. With a budget of over £1.2 billion in 2020–21, its mission is to "improve the health and wealth of the nation through research". The NIHR was established in 2006 under the government's Best Research for Best Health strategy, and is funded by the Department of Health and Social Care. As a research funder and research partner of the NHS, public health and social care, the NIHR complements the work of the Medical Research Council. NIHR focuses on translational research, clinical research and applied health and social care research.

Evidence-based dentistry (EBD) is the dental part of the more general movement toward evidence-based medicine and other evidence-based practices. The pervasive access to information on the internet includes different aspects of dentistry for both the dentists and patients. This has created a need to ensure that evidence referenced to are valid, reliable and of good quality.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Holistic nursing</span> Medical care practice

Holistic nursing is a way of treating and taking care of the patient as a whole body, which involves physical, social, environmental, psychological, cultural and religious factors. There are many theories that support the importance of nurses approaching the patient holistically and education on this is there to support the goal of holistic nursing. The important skill to be used in holistic nursing would be communicating skills with patients and other practitioners. This emphasizes that patients being treated would be treated not only in their body but also their mind and spirit.. Holistic nursing is a nursing speciality concerning the integration of one's mind, body, and spirit with his or her environment. This speciality has a theoretical basis in a few grand nursing theories, most notably the science of unitary human beings, as published by Martha E. Rogers in An Introduction to the Theoretical Basis of Nursing, and the mid-range theory Empowered Holistic Nursing Education, as published by Dr. Katie Love. Holistic nursing has gained recognition by the American Nurses Association (ANA) as a nursing specialty with a defined scope of practice and standards. Holistic nursing focuses on the mind, body, and spirit working together as a whole and how spiritual awareness in nursing can help heal illness. Holistic medicine focuses on maintaining optimum well-being and preventing rather than just treating disease.

Evidence Aid is an international platform that was formed out of the need to deliver time sensitive access to systematic reviews for use in the event of disasters and other humanitarian emergencies. The method of using systematic reviews is to provide evidence for use by policy makers, clinicians, regulators, and even the general public who benefit when these materials are easy to understand and are accessible. The vision of Evidence Aid is to create and satisfy an increasing demand for evidence to improve the impact of humanitarian aid by stimulating the use of an evidence-based approach. Evidence Aid was founded in 2004. It is currently a project that is housed by the Cochrane Collaboration and Queen's University Belfast. Evidence Aid was established by several members of the international Cochrane Collaboration following the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami. Evidence Aid was formed to provide systematic reviews on the effects of interventions and actions of relevance prior to, in the course of and during the aftermath of disasters or other humanitarian emergencies, in order to improve health-related outcomes; their aim is to work with those who need and use this evidence, as well as working with researchers and publishers to facilitate freely accessible materials to meet the information needs for those facing humanitarian emergencies and disasters. Evidence Aid works in collaboration with other organizations including Public Health England; Red Cross Flanders, International Rescue Committee; Centers for Disease Control; Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine; and the University of Oxford.

References

  1. "FreePint Features Article: Women's Medicine". Web.freepint.com. 1 December 2008. Archived from the original on 23 January 2013. Retrieved 5 August 2012.
  2. Baker, Gavin (23 November 2008). "Peter Suber, Open Access News". Earlham.edu. Retrieved 5 August 2012.
  3. "Introducing FIGO CPD: encouraging, enhancing and embedding continuous professional development". FIGO. 2 February 2021.
  4. "HONcode certificate: respect of the 8 HONcode principles by the health website". Hon.ch. 25 November 2011. Retrieved 5 August 2012.