In Cochrane reviews, risk of bias assessments for allocation concealment were frequently not in line with Cochrane's Handbook guidance

Ref ID 346
First Author I. Propadalo
Journal JOURNAL OF CLINICAL EPIDEMIOLOGY
Year Of Publishing 2019
URL https://www.jclinepi.com/article/S0895-4356(18)30625-5/fulltext
Keywords Cochrane
Risk of bias
General medical
Problem(s) Flawed risk of bias undertaken
Weaknesses identified in some Cochrane reviews
Number of systematic reviews included 721
Summary of Findings One-third (29%) of risk of bias judgments about allocation concealment in Cochrane reviews were discrepant from the Cochrane Handbook recommendations. Most discrepancies were made for trials where risk of bias was judged as low (92%). Cochrane authors used 66 categories of comments describing envelopes as a method of allocation concealment. In 66 envelope-related categories, describing risk of bias assessments from 15% of the analysed RCTs, most of the judgments were rated as low risk of bias, although only one of those categories is associated with low risk of bias according to the Cochrane Handbook.
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? Yes