Evaluation of spin in the abstracts of systematic reviews and meta-analyses focused on treatments of alcohol use disorder.

Background: With 14.4 million U.S. adults diagnosed with alcohol use disorder (AUD) annually, effective treatments for combatting this condition are essential. Clinicians are often guided by systematic reviews and meta-analyses - considered the gold standard of research. Spin, a biased way of reporting results, may lead to misinterpretation of research findings, resulting in suboptimal patient care.Objective: Our primary objective was to investigate the presence of spin in the abstracts of systematic reviews of AUD treatments.Methods: After systematically searching MEDLINE and Embase for systematic reviews of AUD treatments, abstracts were evaluated for the nine most severe types of spin. Additional article characteristics were concurrently extracted and study quality was evaluated. Descriptive statistics of spin were calculated and associations between spin and study characteristics were determined through Fisher's exact and logistic regression.Results: Among 79 included systematic reviews, 44 instances of spin were identified spanning 43% of our sample (34/79). Of the nine forms of spin, eight were found with a majority of instances being "selective reporting of or overemphasis on efficacy outcomes" (13/44, 29.5% of cases). The majority of articles were rated as critically low quality (51/79, 64.6%). No association was found between the presence of spin and extracted study characteristics.Conclusions: Spin was found in more than 40% of systematic review abstracts that evaluated pharmacotherapies in the treatment of AUD. Coupled with the finding that the majority of systematic reviews on the subject were of low quality, increased awareness of spin among physicians may be warranted.

Database selection in systematic reviews: an insight through clinical neurology.

BACKGROUND: Failure to perform a comprehensive search when designing a systematic review (SR) can lead to bias, reducing the validity of review's conclusions. OBJECTIVE: We examined the frequency and choice of databases used by reviewers in clinical neurology. METHODS: Ninety-five SRs and/or meta-analyses were located across five prominent neurology journals between 2008 and 2014. Methods sections were reviewed, and all bibliographic databases were coded. RESULTS: On average, 2.59 databases were used in SR searches. Seven reviews included an information specialist, and these reviews reported a greater number of information sources used during the search process. Thirty-nine databases were reported across studies. PubMed/MEDLINE® and EMBASE were cited most frequently. DISCUSSION: Searching too few databases may reduce the validity and generalisability of SR results. We found that the majority of systematic reviewers in clinical neurology do not search an adequate number of databases, which may yield a biased sample of primary studies and, thus, may influence the accuracy of summary effects. CONCLUSIONS: Systematic reviewers should aim to search a sufficient number of databases to minimise selection bias. Additionally, systematic reviewers should include information specialists in designing SR methodology, as this may improve systematic review quality.

Database choices in endocrine systematic reviews.

OBJECTIVE: The choice of bibliographic database during the systematic review search process has been an ongoing conversation among information specialists. With newer information sources, such as Google Scholar and clinical trials registries, we were interested in which databases were utilized by information specialists and systematic review researchers. METHOD: We retrieved 144 systematic reviews and meta-analyses from 4 clinical endocrinology journals and extracted all information sources used during the search processes. RESULTS: Findings indicate that traditional bibliographic databases are most often used, followed by regional databases, clinical trials registries, and gray literature databases. CONCLUSIONS: This study informs information specialists about additional resources that may be considered during the search process.

Assessment of transparent and reproducible research practices in the psychiatry literature.

BACKGROUND: Reproducibility is a cornerstone of scientific advancement; however, many published works may lack the core components needed for study reproducibility. AIMS: In this study, we evaluate the state of transparency and reproducibility in the field of psychiatry using specific indicators as proxies for these practices. METHODS: An increasing number of publications have investigated indicators of reproducibility, including research by Harwicke et al, from which we based the methodology for our observational, cross-sectional study. From a random 5-year sample of 300 publications in PubMed-indexed psychiatry journals, two researchers extracted data in a duplicate, blinded fashion using a piloted Google form. The publications were examined for indicators of reproducibility and transparency, which included availability of: materials, data, protocol, analysis script, open-access, conflict of interest, funding and online preregistration. RESULTS: This study ultimately evaluated 296 randomly-selected publications with a 3.20 median impact factor. Only 107 were available online. Most primary authors originated from USA, UK and the Netherlands. The top three publication types were cohort studies, surveys and clinical trials. Regarding indicators of reproducibility, 17 publications gave access to necessary materials, four provided in-depth protocol and one contained raw data required to reproduce the outcomes. One publication offered its analysis script on request; four provided a protocol availability statement. Only 107 publications were publicly available: 13 were registered in online repositories and four, ten and eight publications included their hypothesis, methods and analysis, respectively. Conflict of interest was addressed by 177 and reported by 31 publications. Of 185 publications with a funding statement, 153 publications were funded and 32 were unfunded. CONCLUSIONS: Currently, Psychiatry research has significant potential to improve adherence to reproducibility and transparency practices. Thus, this study presents a reference point for the state of reproducibility and transparency in Psychiatry literature. Future assessments are recommended to evaluate and encourage progress.

Clinical trials registries are underused in the pregnancy and childbirth literature: a systematic review of the top 20 journals.

BACKGROUND: Systematic reviews and meta-analyses that do not include unpublished data in their analyses may be prone to publication bias, which in some cases has been shown to have deleterious consequences on determining the efficacy of interventions. METHODS: We retrieved systematic reviews and meta-analyses published in the past 8 years (January 1, 2007-December 31, 2015) from the top 20 journals in the Pregnancy and Childbirth literature, as rated by Google Scholar's h5-index. A meta-epidemiologic analysis was performed to determine the frequency with which authors searched clinical trials registries for unpublished data. RESULTS: A PubMed search retrieved 372 citations, 297 of which were deemed to be either a systematic review or a meta-analysis and were included for analysis. Twelve (4 %) of these searched at least one WHO-approved clinical trials registry or clinicaltrials.gov. CONCLUSION: Systematic reviews and meta-analyses published in pregnancy and childbirth journals do not routinely report searches of clinical trials registries. Including these registries in systematic reviews may be a promising avenue to limit publication bias if registry searches locate unpublished trial data that could be used in the systematic review.

Systematic Reviewers in Clinical Neurology Do Not Routinely Search Clinical Trials Registries.

We examined the use of clinical trials registries in published systematic reviews and meta-analyses from clinical neurology. A review of publications between January 1, 2008 and December 31, 2014 from five neuroscience journals (Annals of Neurology, Brain, Lancet Neurology, Neurology, and The Neuroscientist) was performed to identify eligible systematic reviews. The systematic reviews comprising the final sample were independently appraised to determine if clinical trials registries had been included as part of the search process. Studies acknowledging the use of a trials registry were further examined to determine whether trial data had been incorporated into the analysis. The initial search yielded 194 studies, of which 78 systematic reviews met the selection criteria. Of those, five acknowledged the use of a specific clinical trials registry: four reviewed unpublished trial data and two incorporated unpublished trial data into their results. Based on our sample of systematic reviews, there was no increase in the use of trials registries in systematic review searches over time. Few systematic reviews published in clinical neurology journals included data from relevant clinical trials registries.