Paper – Systematic Reviewlution

Ref ID	890
First Author	U. Matterne
Journal	BMC MEDICAL RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
Year Of Publishing	2023
URL	https://bmcmedresmethodol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12874-023-01899-4
Keywords	• Risk of bias • Paediatrics • Low reporting quality • Non-Cochrane reviews • Pre-specification • Disclosure
Problem(s)	• Lack of prespecification in eligibility criteria • Reasons for excluding potentially eligible studies not provided • Incorrect interpretation or statistical inference error from meta-analysis • Conflicts of interest or funding of included studies not assessed • Low methodological (AMSTAR) quality • High risk of bias (ROBIS) • Errors in effect estimate calculations or data synthesis
Number of systematic reviews included	12
Summary of Findings	From twelve systematic reviews of the effects of earlier versus later introduction of complementary feeding on the incidence of allergy/allergic disease in infants and children indexed across PubMed, Medline (Ovid), and Web of Science Core Collection on 13th January 2022. Nine of the 12 included systematic reviews (75%) were found to be of critically low to low methodological quality according to AMSTAR-2 and to be at high risk of bias according to ROBIS. Half of the reviews did not provide an adequate explanation of the study designs for inclusion; half did not provide a list of excluded studies and the reasons for exclusion. Nine of the 12 reviews (75%) did not consider funding sources for the included studies. Using ROBIS, only 2 reviews were judged to have specified adequate eligibility criteria; all others were downgraded. Concerns regarding the identification and selection of relevant studies were raised by 8 reviews (66.6%). Nine of the reviews (75%) were found to show major flaws in their synthesis and findings approach.
Did the article find that the problem(s) led to qualitative changes in interpretation of the results?	N/A
Are the methods of the article described in enough detail to replicate the study?	Yes