Doping Authority Netherlands is a knowledge institute. The experience of Doping Authority Netherlands and its legal predecessors ensure that the current work can be done as well as possible. Some years ago, it was noted that the employees of Doping Authority Netherlands themselves possess a lot of knowledge and experience but that a professional organisation should not be dependent on this situation. Since then, the subject of 'knowledge management' has become a part of the day-to-day work and it is a separate item in budgets and annual reports.
In addition to the archives required for each department, it was decided to set up a database with the most essential anti-doping information: the Anti-Doping Knowledge Centre (ADKC). The ADKC has proven its worth in recent years as the largest collection of doping-related documents in the world. In 2019, 547 records were added, bringing the total to 6,087 records at the end of the year. In addition, existing documents are constantly checked and improved, in part on the basis of new relevant search terms.
Most of the database consists of legal documents, and in particular the motivated decisions of competent disciplinary committees for the imposition of doping sanctions. The majority are decisions of the sports tribunal CAS but, increasingly, the legal decisions of the disciplinary committees of international sports federations and national disciplinary bodies can also be found in the database. The decisions of a few dozen sports and countries are now being processed. In addition, contact is sought on a continuous basis with countries and sports that do not yet share their decisions. The main objective of these efforts is to provide access to the available case law in the field of doping and therefore to provide a more robust basis for future decisions.
In addition, the website contains scientific articles on all conceivable doping topics, educational materials and all kinds of doping documents. In this way, the ADKC plays a historical role because outdated documents are generally difficult to find on the internet. In 2019, a specific 'record' was created bringing together all the sport-wide prohibited lists, from the first list of the International Olympic Committee from 1968 up to and including the 2019 WADA prohibited list. That makes it possible to accurately trace the history of each prohibited substance.
Visitors to the website come from all over the world. There was an increase in levels of interest from Russia and Canada in 2019. The target group of the ADKC consists of NADO and IF staff, the staff of other international organisations active in the field of doping (IOC, WADA, UNESCO, Council of Europe, European Union), journalists, lawyers, scientists, administrators and researchers, and finally athletes and athlete support staff (coaches, doctors, physiotherapists...).
The database is freely accessible through the website www.doping.nl.