MEDBOX Video Series
A four-part video clip series is now available that presents the idea behind MEDBOX and briefly explains various ways of using it (registration, document search, features, overview of available toolboxes). These vidoeclips can be found here and on YouTube.
Where did the idea of
MEDBOX come from?
It all started during an UN-organised Health
Cluster Meeting in Myanmar in 2008. During a discussion concerning the sharing
of information many participants observed that they were struggling to access
WHO guidelines and other practical guidelines, although internet access was not
a problem. That was the moment when the Medical Mission
Institute in Wuerzburg had the idea of creating an open-access website where all
the relevant health documents are collected and readily available for everyone
and everywhere. Finally, in October 2013, the vision became reality and MEDBOX
went online.
The MEDBOX
team of the Medical Mission Institute received support by over a dozen
internationally active humanitarian and development organizations to start this
innovative project. In December 2015, two years after its launch, the MEDBOX has
had over 1,800,000 views and over 1,400,000 downloads.
Do I need to pay user
fees?
No, MEDBOX
is free of charge and follows the strategy of open access.
If it is for free, what is
the advantage of registering with MEDBOX?
Registered
users have access to individualised tools such as creating own favourites in
their individualised folder structure. The registration is free of charge. The
additional information that you will have to fill out is being treated
confidentially according to German data protection law and is used by the
administrators to better understand the user profiles, allowing to cater for
the registered users interests and professional foci.
How is MEDBOX financed?
MEDBOX is an independent platform providing information free of charge. We are dependent on your financial support for the continuous management and quality assurance of the website. Please support us to continue this project!
Is the homepage available
in other languages?
Although
MEDBOX was set up in English, French, Spanish and Russian, the documents hosted here are available in many
languages. MEDBOX wants to make a special effort to collate information,
educational and communication material in local languages (such as health
education posters). Having said this, we are planning to add more languages for
the homepage and the search function at a later stage.
How do you assess which
materials are suitable to go into MEDBOX and which ones are not?
Apart from
the most common documents used by experts around the world we have a constantly
growing group of experts for each technical subgroup of documents, who screen and approve the relevance of documents. Users have the option to rank
(and later comment on) the relevance of the documents. Additionally, the
transparent statistics of clicks and downloads are a helpful tool for new users
to observe what other users look at.
How up-to-date are the
documents in MEDBOX?
The MEDBOX
team ensures a weekly screening of new online publications. One of our main
roles is to establish open communication channels and share knowledge and
information with our partners to ensure that the highest quality of medical
information is being made available. The close cooperation with the library of
the Medical Mission Institute helps to screen and find the latest documents.
Is MEDBOX designed only
for health professionals?
MEDBOX is targeting national and international
actors of health action in humanitarian assistance and development contexts
alike. This includes governmental and non-governmental institutions and their
employees. It is also directed towards teachers and learners.
Users of
MEDBOX are e.g. responsible persons of the ‘provincial disaster committee’ and
the regional health cluster in the Pakistani Region Balochistan dealing with
flood relief; the cluster team of the ministry of health in Bangladesh after a
cyclone; or the medical team of a ‘community based organisation’ (CBO) in
Zimbabwe dealing with cholera cases or epidemic typhoid.
Is MEDBOX merely a data
collection for academics or is it also accessible for, say, community health
workers?
MEDBOX is
designed for all people working in the context of health. Everyone with
interest in improving quality of their health related work is a potential user.
This includes community health workers at all levels as well as decision makers
at political level.
Reports say that a high
ratio of potential users, e.g. in Africa or after a natural catastrophe don’t
have internet access to start with, so how useful is MEDBOX really?
A growing
number of internet users access this medium through their mobile smartphones.
MEDBOX can be used on Smartphones and tablets, and the option to save documents
in the favourites “MY OWN MEDBOX” will allow saving documents of interest
without the necessity of downloading on the spot. An App Version will allow
offline access of these documents.
How can I support MEDBOX?
Copyright
Our website and its
contents are subject to Federal Copyright Law. Unless expressly permitted by
law (§ 44a of the copyright law, Urheberrechtsgesetz, UrhG), every form of
utilising, reproducing or processing works subject to copyright protection on
our website requires the prior consent of the respective owner of the rights.
Individual reproductions of a work are allowed only for private use and must
not serve either directly or indirectly, commercial activities. MMI and MEDBOX
follow the philosophy of creative commons licencing and open access.
