J. Glanville et I. Smith, EVALUATING THE OPTIONS FOR DEVELOPING DATABASES TO SUPPORT RESEARCH-BASED MEDICINE AT THE NHS CENTER FOR REVIEWS AND DISSEMINATION, International journal of medical informatics, 47(1-2), 1997, pp. 83-86
The paper presents the results of a questionnaire survey and user inte
rface review group experiments to determine the value and ease of use
of the Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effectiveness (DARE) and th
e NHS Economic Evaluations Database (NEED). The results of are interpr
eted with other recent studies of the use of electronic databases, inc
luding the NHS Research Register User Requirements Specification. The
study found that most frequent users of the DARE database tend to use
the CD-ROM version. Librarians were found to have the greatest awarene
ss of the databases, with relatively low levels of use by operational
NHS Staff. Untrained users found the online databases difficult to acc
ess and had erroneous perceptions of the database content which were o
nly realised when queries returned unexpected answers. Experienced use
rs of online information systems tended to want more sophisticated sea
rch facilities than inexperienced users. Nearly all users in the revie
w groups wanted to access the databases in conjunction with other info
rmation sources, such as the Cochrane Library, Medline and the ACP Jou
rnal Club, highlighting the need for cross organisational strategies f
or the dissemination of research-based information. (C) 1997 Elsevier
Science B.V.