Skip Navigation

The European Journal of Public Health 2007 17(5):411-413; doi:10.1093/eurpub/ckm094
This Article
Right arrow Full Text Freely available
Right arrow FREE Full Text (PDF) Freely available
Right arrow E-letters: Submit a response
Right arrow Alert me when this article is cited
Right arrow Alert me when E-letters are posted
Right arrow Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
Right arrow Email this article to a friend
Right arrow Similar articles in this journal
Right arrow Similar articles in ISI Web of Science
Right arrow Similar articles in PubMed
Right arrow Alert me to new issues of the journal
Right arrow Add to My Personal Archive
Right arrow Download to citation manager
Right arrowRequest Permissions
Google Scholar
Right arrow Articles by Petticrew, M.
Right arrow Search for Related Content
PubMed
Right arrow PubMed Citation
Right arrow Articles by Petticrew, M.
Social Bookmarking
Add to CiteULike   Add to Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us  
What's this?

© The Author 2007. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Public Health Association. All rights reserved.

Viewpoints

‘More research needed’: plugging gaps in the evidence base on health inequalities

Mark Petticrew

MRC Social and Public Health Sciences Unit, University of Glasgow, G12 8RZ

Correspondence: email: Mark@msoc.mrc.gla.ac.uk

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.


   Introduction
 
Policymakers and public health researchers have demanded better evidence of the effects of interventions on public health and health inequalities and have pointed to the relative absence of rigorous outcome evaluations in this area. While most of these commentators agree that health inequalities are a problem, the means of tackling them often seems to rest on poor evidential foundations. This is no longer surprising, as the problem has been well-documented and the solution probably seems clear: if there is not enough evidence, then obviously we need more; and if the evidence is ‘weak’, well, then, it just needs to be ‘stronger’ in future. The funding environment in the UK, at least, is supportive of the production of this new, stronger evidence, with several new funding initiatives which are aiming to foster the production of new evaluations of public health interventions. However, it might be useful to consider further what ‘more . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   What sort of evidence is needed?
 

   Ranking evidence
 

   Problems with outcomes
 

   Ecologies of evidence?
 

   Conclusion
 

Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us    What's this?


This article has been cited by other articles:


Home page
 Eur J Public HealthHome page
E. Waters, M. Petticrew, N. Priest, A. Weightman, A. Harden, and J. Doyle
Evidence synthesis, upstream determinants and health inequalities: the role of a proposed new Cochrane Public Health Review Group
Eur J Public Health, June 1, 2008; 18(3): 221 - 223.
[Full Text] [PDF]