UNC and RTI International chosen to continue Evidence-Based Practice Center
| October 17, 2007 | |
| The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, a division of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, has selected the RTI-UNC Evidence-Based Practice Center to be among 14 centers that will comprise the third iteration of its Evidence-Based Practice Centers program. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in collaboration with RTI International, has managed the RTI-UNC Evidence-Based Practice Center since its creation in 1997.
“UNC faculty and staff look forward to continuing our work with Research Triangle International (RTI) and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality” said Tim Carey, M.D., director of UNC’s Sheps Center for Health Services Research and co-director of the program with Meera Viswanathan, PhD, at RTI. Carey is also clinical professor of epidemiology in the UNC School of Public Health and professor of medicine in the UNC School of Medicine. As part of the renewed five-year contract, the RTI-UNC Evidence-Based Practice Center will continue to conduct research syntheses and analyses of the scientific literature on clinical and other health care delivery issues and produce reports and technology assessments on the evidence. “This work is exciting and of direct relevance to clinicians and the public,” Carey said. “Patients can now often choose among several potential treatment options for a disease, and we need unbiased information regarding their relative risks and benefits. Our role is to provide that information.” Since its inception the RTI-UNC Evidence-Based Practice Center has produced and published evidence-based reports on a variety of health-care topics including routine use of episiotomy, cesarean delivery on maternal request, eating disorders, and second-generation antidepressants in treatment of depressive disorders in adults. The resulting reports are used by federal and state agencies, private-sector professional societies, health delivery systems, providers, and others committed to evidence-based health care. “The Evidence-Based Practice Centers program has risen to the challenge of harnessing the research data and making it relevant for decision makers in the health care arena,” said Carolyn M. Clancy, M.D, director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. “The reports generated from the program continue to provide meaningful information to clinicians, patients, and others so they can make better informed health-care decisions.” # # # School of Public Health contact: Ramona DuBose, director of communications, (919) 966-7467 or ramona_dubose@unc.edu. News Services contact: Clinton Colmenares, (919) 843-1991 or clinton_colmenares@unc.edu. |
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