Most systematic reviews of adverse effects did not include unpublished data

Ref ID 374
First Author S. Golder
Journal JOURNAL OF CLINICAL EPIDEMIOLOGY
Year Of Publishing 2016
URL https://www.jclinepi.com/article/S0895-4356(16)30135-4/fulltext
Keywords • Grey literature
• General medical
Problem(s) • Grey literature excluded
• Reliance on randomised controlled trials for harms / safety data
Article Type Empirical
Article Subtype Cross-sectional survey/Methodological systematic review
First Author Country United Kingdom
Aim To assess the proportion of systematic reviews of adverse effects which search for unpublished data and the success rates of identifying unpublished data for inclusion in a systematic review for all records published in 2014 in the Database of Abstracts of Reviews of Effects.
Level of Investigation Descriptive
Summary of Findings Only 39% of all the included reviews searched a specific source for unpublished data, such as conference abstracts or trial registries, and nearly half of these reviews (48%) included unpublished data. Overall, 22% of reviews included unpublished data/studies
Number of systematic reviews included 348
Number of eligible systematic reviews assessed 9129
Treatment impacted No
Treatment impacted description
Interpretation impacted Not Applicable
Interpretation impacted description