The School of Health & Social Care

Workshops to strengthen health research in Nepal

Page published 7 January 2011

Professor Edwin van Teijlingen visiting Nepal

Bournemouth University (BU) is partnering a project to strengthen health research in Nepal.

Working with the Universities of Sheffield and Aberdeen, as well as the Development Resource Centre in Kathmandu, BU’s School of Health & Social Care is a key member of the Partnership on Improving Access to Research Literature for Higher Education Institutions (PARI) in Nepal.

Funded by the British Council and the UK government’s Department for International Development, PARI aims to build research capacity in Nepal over a three–year period. The British Council’s grant is made through the Development Partnerships in Higher Education (DelPHE) programme which supports nine project grants in Asia. PARI is the only project in Nepal funded under this particular scheme.

“We must raise the profile of health research in Nepal and share its expertise across developing countries,” said Professor Edwin van Teijlingen from BU. Professor van Teijlingen’s overseas research is largely based in Nepal where he is a Visiting Professor at the Manmohan Memorial Institute of Health Sciences at Purbanchal University in Kathmandu.

Mr Bhimsen Devkota of the Development Resource Centre added, “PARI will contribute to the development of a research culture in higher education in Nepal.”

Now in its second year, PARI is actively encouraging higher education institutions in the country to access and assess research–based information in disciplines such as medicine, pharmacy, nursing and public health.

As part of a new project entitled ‘Improving Access to Research Literature for Higher Education’, PARI is organising five international workshops on access to health research and evidence–based practice. The workshops are aimed at university and college teachers with a separate session for college librarians and information specialists. The workshops are informed by a curriculum review of all health–related courses at the major universities in Nepal and a needs assessment of lecturers, librarians and students of the country’s major universities. These two studies, conducted earlier this year as part of PARI, helped to identify gaps in knowledge and skills around the capabilities of gathering existing research information.

The partners hope to move university lecturers in Nepal away from textbook teaching by making them aware of the vast resources available online and how to be more critical of them. By changing attitudes towards the importance of research–based or evidence–based practice, PARI aims to strengthen research capacity in Nepal perhaps encouraging talented people to stay or return to the country to make their own research contributions.