| Ref ID | 942 |
| First Author | F. Mikelis |
| Journal | EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF ORTHODONTICS |
| Year Of Publishing | 2022 |
| URL | https://academic.oup.com/ejo/article/44/4/468/6527159?login=true |
| Keywords |
• Non-Cochrane reviews • Publication bias • Dentistry • Grey literature |
| Problem(s) |
• Poor consideration of publication bias • Grey literature excluded |
| Article Type | Empirical |
| Article Subtype | Cross-sectional survey/Methodological systematic review |
| First Author Country | Greece |
| Aim | To assess the extent of publication bias assessment in systematic reviews across the orthodontic literature indexed in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, from January 2010, until November 2021. |
| Level of Investigation | Descriptive |
| Summary of Findings | From 289 included systematic reviews across the orthodontic literature indexed in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, from January 2010, until November 2021. Efforts to search within unpublished literature were reported in 191 out of 289 Reviews (66.1%), while efforts to communicate with primary study authors were recorded for 150 of 289 of those (51.9%). An appropriate strategy plan to address issues of publication bias, conditional on the number of studies available and the methodology plan reported, was followed in 78 of the 139 meta-analyses (56.1%). Formal publication bias assessment was actually reported in 35 of 139 meta-analyses (25.2%), while only half of those (19/35; 54.3%) followed an appropriately established methodology. Ten of the latter 19 studies detected the presence of publication bias (52.6%). Predictor variables of appropriate publication bias assessment did not reveal any significant effects. |
| Number of systematic reviews included | 289 |
| Number of eligible systematic reviews assessed | 322 |
| Treatment impacted | No |
| Treatment impacted description | |
| Interpretation impacted | Not Applicable |
| Interpretation impacted description |