We congratulate Adriani Nikolakopoulou and Leonie van Grootel, winners of this year's Thomas C Chalmers awards for the best long and short presentations addressing methodological issues related to systematic reviews at the Edinburgh Colloquium. The awards were presented at the end of the Colloquium.

Tom Chalmers (1917-1995) was an outspoken advocate of randomised trials, whether at the bedside, at professional meetings, in class or in situations pertaining to his own life. His creativity spanned his entire career, influencing clinicians and methodologists alike. He is perhaps best known for the notion ‘randomise the first patient’, his belief that it is more ethical to randomise patients than to treat them in the absence of good evidence. In his later years, in arguably his most important work, Tom and his colleagues showed that, had information from RCTs been systematically and cumulatively synthesised, important treatments such as thrombolytic therapy for myocardial infarction would have been recognised as useful much earlier.

Presentations are judged by the Thomas C Chalmers Award Committee* during the course of the Colloquium, and the two recipients receive a certificate and US$500 each.

Winner for the best long oral presentation:  Adriani Nikolakopoulou: University of Bern, Switzerland.

Abstract: The emerging evidence synthesis tools: Actively Living Network Meta-analysis.

Presentation: The emerging evidence synthesis tools: Actively Living Network Meta-analysis.

Winner for the best short oral:  Leonie van Grootel: Tilburg University, Netherlands.

Presentation: Integrating findings from qualitative studies in a Bayesian meta-analysis.

*2018's Committee:  Tianjing Li (Chair), Ian Saldanha, Ian Shrier, Jelena Savovic, Jimmy Toan Le, Karen Robinson, Karsten Jørgensen, Mala Mann, Mark Jones, Mark Simmonds, Matthew Page, Mona Nasser, Thomas Debray, Valerie King. Co-ordinated by Louisa Dunn.