My good colleagues at Cancer52 (the rare cancers coalition) sent me this, the third edition of the Burson-Marsteller directory of patient groups.

On a purely practical level this tome is vital in helping to find your way round the various patient groups working on the European stage.

Note the introduction by the EU Health Commissioner, Robert Madelin, urging greater transparency by patient groups as regards their funding sources . The historic issue that has beset EU patient groups and colaitions is the degree of funding given and influence over their work that pharma has.

Clearly the authors are trying to move in the direction of greater transparency in the way that the listings are presented. Hopefully, by the fourth edition of the directory each entry will be better populated with this sort of information and in a way that might enable better analysis as well as comparisons across different health sectors.