Establishment of a European information network for the field of ethics in medicine, in health professions and in health care

Project Information

Grant agreement ID: BMH4961258

Start date 1 March 1996

End date 28 February 1999

Funded under

• Specific research, technological development and demonstration programme in the field of biomedicine and health, 1994-1998

Total cost € 0,00

EU contribution No data

Coordinated by

Georg-August-Universität Göttingen
Germany

Exploitable results

Establishment of a European information network for the fields of ethics in medicine, in health care and in health professions

Starting in 1996 at their respective actual national efforts in biomedical ethic documentation, four project partners - Akademie fur Ethik in der Medzin/Gottingen, Dept. of Ethics, Philosophy and History of Medicine/ Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen, Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale/ Paris, Swedish institute for Health Services Development/ Stockholm - developed a common strategy for the collection, analysis and indexing of relevant information, like published and grey literature, decrees and laws, conference proceedings, etc. Based on commonly adopted rules for bibliographic interchange , a common thesaurus of keywords, and indexing rules, the databank EUROETHICS was established. This databank is designed as a nucleus for an extended European network in the future. As of March 1999, the databank contained 11500 references (7% Dutch, 31% French, 46% German, 16% Scandinavian origin), and is consulted 2560 times per month corresponding to 85 times per day. Additionally 49 subscribers of standing orders get regular packages for their individual topics. The databank is searchable for the public online via DIMDI/ Cologne by common English interface, and via Internet by SPRI/ Stockholm by optionally Dutch, English, French, German or Swedish simplified search forms. Additional supporting Internet services are developed by the working group, as e-mail discussion forum EUROETH-L (at present 63 subscribers), fulltext services, directly and by links to other providers, orientation pages with links to institutions working on biomedical ethics, and to other information providers in this field, Interactive calendar of events (the prototype was presented in December 1998, it will be released soon). A contract, signed by the four partner institutions at the end of the project, will ensure the continuity of the services developed within this project.