Published: 23 June 2020

HRB Open Research collections - we want your suggestions

We are offering the HRB community the opportunity to suggest new themed collections on HRB Open Research. You can do this by contacting info@hrbopenresearch.org with your ideas.

'Collections are collated selections of thematic content', says Dr Peter Hyde, Project Officer, HRB. 'This is usually a compilation of publications relating to a specific area of interest, either through a disease classification, area of health policy/practice, or relating to a specific community. Format of content in a collection can vary, and current collections contain a mix of open letters, study protocols, research articles, and systematic reviews to name but a few'.

HRB Open Research currently hosts four emerging collections with plans to further develop and expand these elements of the platform in the future.

Ageing Populations collection

This collection houses 14 articles so far, with four of these now indexed in Pubmed.

'The first collection of papers on ageing reflect an eclectic approach to the curation, covering training, education, protocols, practice and policy-making in relation to the care of older people in Ireland.' – Prof Eamon O’Shea (collection advisor).

HRB-TMRN collection

Advised by Dr Sandra Galvin (Programme Manager HRB-Trial Methodology Research Network) and contains seven articles with two of these indexed in Pubmed.

'The HRB-TMRN is a collaborative initiative between a number of Irish and international higher education institutes and methodology centres. Its mission is to strengthen the methodology and reporting of trials in health and social care in Ireland so that they become more relevant, accessible and influential for patients and other service users, practitioners, policy makers and the public'. – Dr Sandra Galvin (collection advisor).

Maternal and Child Health collection

This collection which contains 14 articles, five of which are now indexed in Pubmed.

'This collection aims to bring research from a range of disciplines together, including: midwifery, nursing, obstetrics, gynaecology, prenatal medicine, neonatology, pediatrics, nutrition, psychology, epidemiology, public health, dentistry, health policy, health economics, and sociology'. – Dr Marita Hennessey (collection advisor). 

Coronavirus (COVID-19) collection

This collection currently has seven articles including open letters and study protocols.

'This new collection aggregates and showcases all COVID-19 related research articles published on the HRB Open Research platform and provides full access to the underlying data and expert peer review, thus allowing others to reuse, build-upon, learn and further support the global efforts to tackle this pressing public health emergency'. – Patricia Clarke (Programme Manager for Policy and EU Funding, HRB).

As part of the national COVID-19 Rapid Response Research and Innovation programme the HRB and IRC jointly approved 21 COVID-19 projects worth €3.4million, supporting projects that address a number of challenges in the fields of medical countermeasures, health service readiness, and social and policy countermeasures.

The HRB is also a signatory to the joint statement, “Sharing research data and findings relevant to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak” led by Wellcome and signed by leading funders, publishers, societies and organisations around the world, with each signatory having a responsibility to drive and facilitate the rapid sharing of research.

HRB Open Research, and the COVID-19 collection in particular, offers a readily accessible, indexed home for data and other publication outputs from COVID-19 related research.

Dr Hyde concludes, 'We are excited to see how the HRB Open Research collections develop over the next year and welcome your suggestions of other collections you might like to see in the future. Please contact us at info@hrbopenresearch.org'.