Changing Mindsets: Research Capacity strengthening in low and middle-income countries
Summary
In the spring of 2005, the Global Forum for Health Research, the Council on Health Research for Development (COHRED) and the UNICEF/ UNDP/World Bank/WHO Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR) agreed to collaborate on a project to define practical ways in which health research capacity strengthening (RCS) can be systematically operationalized to improve the performance of national health research systems, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). In August 2005, the first joint consultation was held at the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue in Geneva, Switzerland. The consultation brought together 15 selected public health and development experts from all over the world, including representatives from the World Bank, INDEPTH Network, the European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership, several leading universities as well as the executive directors and senior staff from COHRED, the Global Forum and TDR. The primary recommendation of the consultation was to commission analytical studies to further understand the subject and make health research capacity strengthening work for LMICs. This publication is the result of those commissioned studies and the fruitful collaboration between three leading organizations, who are advocating and supporting research capacity strengthening efforts to improve the performance of national health systems.