[28 June 2016] Representatives from the Usher Institute contributed to the creation of the GATHER guidelines, being published today in PLOS Medicine. Image Today, new guidelines for substantiating information collected on diseases, injuries, and deaths were formally adopted, completing a two-year collaboration among experts from several of the world’s most prestigious health institutions. The Guidelines for Accurate and Transparent Health Estimates Reporting, referred to as GATHER, promote best practices in reporting health estimates. Work to formulate the guidelines was funded by The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The guidelines are intended to inform and direct the reporting of estimates of health indicators like causes of death, the incidence and prevalence of diseases and injuries, and indicators of some health determinants, such as people’s behaviors. They are designed for studies that calculate health outcomes for multiple populations by combining several sources of information. We believe these guidelines should be used every time new global health estimates are published in scientific journals.Transparency gets to the essence of credibility in health science. If researchers are not willing to be completely open about their sources of information and methods used for analysis, the credibility of their findings may be questioned. Dr Christopher J.L. MurrayDirector of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), University of Washington, Seattle, USA In addition to Dr Murray, others in the group included Prof Igor Rudan from the Usher Institute, and representatives from the World Health Organization, the Harvard and Johns Hopkins Schools of Public Health, the University of Oxford, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the University of Ottawa, and two medical journals, "The Lancet" and "PLOS Medicine". Video News Release The video below features interviews with IHME’s director, Dr Chris Murray, and Dr Richard Horton, editor of "The Lancet". Video news release on YouTube Read more The Insititute of Health Metrics and Evaluation website The GATHER statement - PLOS Medicine website GATHER statement website Publication date 28 Jun, 2016
