Clinical and methodological implications for research elements in systematic reviews on COVID-19 treatment were often unstructured and under-reported: a metaresearch study

Ref ID 1060
First Author W. Siemens
Journal JOURNAL OF CLINICAL EPIDEMIOLOGY
Year Of Publishing 2024
URL https://www-sciencedirect-com.sheffield.idm.oclc.org/science/article/pii/S0895435623003268?via%3Dihub
Keywords COVID
Certainty
Problem(s) Inconclusive or lack of recommendations
Interpreted without considering certainty or overall quality of the evidence base
Number of systematic reviews included 326
Summary of Findings Of the 326 included SRs, of which 284 SRs (87.1%) stated IfR. Of these 284 SRs, 201 (70.8%) reported using Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses and 66 (23.2%) using GRADE. IfR statements (n = 284) addressing PICO were unstructured and commonly reported ‘population’ (n = 195, 68.7%), ‘intervention’ (n = 242, 85.2%), and ‘outcome’ (n = 127, 44.7%) but not ‘control’ (n = 29, 10.2%). Concepts underlying GRADE domains were infrequently reported in IfR statements of SRs (n = 284): ‘risk of bias’ (n = 14, 4.9%), ‘imprecision’ (n = 8, 2.8%), ‘inconsistency’ (n = 7, 2.5%), ‘publication bias’ (n = 3, 1.1%), and ‘indirectness’ (n = 1, 0.4%).
Did the article find that the problem(s) led to qualitative changes in interpretation of the results? Not Applicable
Are the methods of the article described in enough detail to replicate the study?