The TAP project ECOLE/GRIP developed COLLATE, an environment for the collaborative working of medical authors involved in guideline development and dissemination. COLLATE offers new ways of working for users involved in collaborative literature review and guideline development. The ability of COLLATE to meet specified user and functional requirements (including communications, collaborative working and discussion of clinical issues, multi-author document production and knowledge dissemination) was confirmed in year 2 of the project and by a final evaluation round in the first half of 1999.
ECOLE/GRIP services and tools have been designed and implemented to provide the European oncology community (and other medical sectors) with the means to collaborate on the development of systematic cancer literature reviews and evidence-based guidelines, and to have ready access to best practice in the form of hypermedia clinical guidelines and protocols.
The results have attracted considerable interest from European medical associations and regional health authorities. Exploitation of results started in summer 1999 and the University of Leeds, the FNCLCC, the Aquitaine Regional Council, have signed or are going to sign an agreement with MARI Ltd. for research and not-for-profit use. The regional agency "Aquitaine Europe Communication" is considering distributing and maintaining COLLATE as an application service provider for any European medical association. Both the FNCLCC and the Regional Cancer Network of Aquitaine have already secured funding for deployment, further development and maintenance from the Regional Council of Aquitaine and the French "MinistËre de l'amÈnagement du territoire" within the framework of the "contrat de plan Ètat-rÈgion" for years 2000-2006.
The current version of COLLATE comprises an integrated suite of Lotus Notes databases which enable documents to be multi-authored and controlled within the same distributed, collaborative environment. The Lotus Domino Æ server provides a WWW user interface. This enables COLLATE to offer readily accessible, platform-independent, high levels of functionality whilst continuing to take advantage of in-built Lotus Notes functionality such as document control and workflow management services. The COLLATE WWW site is made up of a set of areas which enable users firstly to establish the administrative framework in which a collaborative literature review, for example, can be carried out, then to undertake editing, review and discussion before authorisation of the final result is attained.
Hypermedia practice guidelines in oncology have been implemented, based on a model developed by the project, in collaboration with the FNCLCC. Guideline discussion, development and update activities undertaken by regional cancer centre groups, particularly in France and the Netherlands, have used ECOLE/GRIP collaborative tools and services. Clinical user groups linked to the project include the Groupe Aquitaine Douleur (pain control) and the French national sarcomas group. Web sites for these groups have been implemented for discussion and guideline development. The activities of a number of these groups, supported by French regional and national governments, form part of a wider goal to develop a shared care telematics infrastructure in South West France (RÈseau d'Information de SantÈ en Aquitaine). Activities are linked to the "RÈseau santÈ social" initiative which provides health professionals throughout France with secure Intranet services.
MARI does not plan to exploit COLLATE as a commercial product, but does plan to exploit techniques and methods developed during the design of COLLATE as the basis for other development work.. MARI has made available an Exploitation Agreement for third-party use of the COLLATE software, which grants in perpetuity rights for non-commercial exploitation within the framework of EC research projects beyond the ECOLE/GRIP (HC1013) project. Under the terms of this agreement, all intellectual property rights are retained by MARI, and any intention for commercial exploitation of the COLLATE software must be re-negotiated and revised terms agreed with MARI prior to such activities.
For general/sales information contact: Julie Brammer or Clive Petty.
For technical information on COLLATE contact:
Steve Archbold.
Telephone: +44 (0) 191 402 0191
Fax: +44 (0) 191 402 1112.
E-mail: sales@mari.co.uk