Objective To assess the evidence for the acceptability and effectiveness of screening women for domestic violence in healthcare settings. Design Systematic review of published quantitative studies. Search strategy Three electronic databases (Medline, Embase, and CINAHL) were searched for articles published in the English language up to February 2001. Included studies Surveys that elicited the attitudes of women and health professionals on the screening of women in health settings; comparative studies conducted in healthcare settings that measured rates of identification of domestic violence in the presence and absence of screening; studies measuring outcomes of interventions for women identified in health settings who experience abuse from a male partner or ex-partner compared with abused women not receiving an intervention. Results 20 papers met the inclusion criteria. In four surveys, 43-85% of women respondents found screening in healthcare settings acceptable. Two surveys of health professionals' views found that two thirds of physicians and almost half of emergency department nurses were not in favour of screening. In nine studies of screening compared with no screening, most detected a greater proportion of abused women identified by healthcare professionals. Six studies of interventions used weak study designs and gave inconsistent results. Other than increased referral to outside agencies, little evidence exists for changes in important outcomes such as decreased exposure to violence. No studies measured quality of life, mental health outcomes, or potential harm to women from screening programmes. Conclusion Although domestic violence is a common problem with major health consequences for women, implementation of screening programmes in healthcare settings cannot be justified. Evidence of the benefit of specific interventions and lack of harm from screening is needed.

Objectives: To review current understanding of the knowledge and information needs of informal caregivers in palliative settings. Data sources: Seven electronic databases were searched for the period January 1994-November 2006: Medline, CINAHL, PsychINFO, Embase, Ovid, Zetoc and Pubmed using a meta-search engine (Metalib®). Key journals and reference lists of selected papers were hand searched. Review methods: Included studies were peer-reviewed journal articles presenting original research. Given a variety of approaches to palliative care research, a validated systematic review methodology for assessing disparate evidence was used in order to assign scores to different aspects of each study (introduction and aims, method and data, sampling, data analysis, ethics and bias, findings/results, transferability/generalizability, implications and usefulness). Analysis was assisted by abstraction of key details of study into a table. Results: Thirty-four studies were included from eight different countries. The evidence was strongest in relation to pain management, where inadequacies in caregiver knowledge and the importance of education were emphasized. The significance of effective communication and information sharing between patient, caregiver and service provider was also emphasized. The evidence for other caregiver knowledge and information needs, for example in relation to welfare and social support was weaker. There was limited literature on non-cancer conditions and the care-giving information needs of black and minority ethnic populations. Overall, the evidence base was predominantly descriptive and dominated by small-scale studies, limiting generalizability. Conclusions: As palliative care shifts into patients' homes, a more rigorously researched evidence base devoted to understanding caregivers knowledge and information needs is required. Research design needs to move beyond the current focus on dyads to incorporate the complex, three-way interactions between patients, service providers and caregivers in end-of-life care settings. Palliative Medicine (2008); xxx: 1-19

The tool may be useful for identifying people who would benefit from further assessment of their risk of falling and appropriate intervention.

Current evidence supports the use of procedural changes that improve the documentation of suspected child maltreatment and that enhance professional awareness. The lack of an evidence based approach to the implementation of child protection training may restrict the ability of all health professionals to fulfil their role in the child protection process. Formal evaluation of a variety of models for the delivery of this training is urgently needed with subsequent dissemination of results that highlight those found to be most effective.