Requirements for trial registration and adherence to reporting guidelines in critical care journals: a meta-epidemiological study of journals' instructions for authors.

BACKGROUND: The purpose of this study was to investigate the policies of critical care journals with regard to guideline adoption and clinical trial registration to understand the extent to which journals use these mechanisms to improve reporting practices. METHODS: The current study's sample comprised 37 critical care journals cataloged in the Expanded Science Citation Index of the 2015 Journal Citation Reports and Google Scholar Metrics h5-index critical care subcategory. A web-based data abstraction was performed to identify which journals required, recommended, or made no mention of 17 different reporting guidelines. We also extracted whether journals required or recommended trial registration. Authors were blinded to one another's ratings until completion of the data validation. Cross tabulations and descriptive statistics were calculated by using STATA 13. RESULTS: Of the 37 critical care journals, 15 (15/37, 40.5%) did not mention a single guideline within their instructions for authors, whereas the remaining 22 (22/37, 59.5%) mentioned one or more guidelines. The Quality of Reporting of Meta-analyses statement and Standards for Reporting Qualitative Research were not mentioned by any journals, whereas the International Committee of Medical Journal Editors Uniform Requirements for Manuscripts (26/37, 70.3%) and Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials statement (17/37, 45.9%) were mentioned most often. Of the 37 critical care journals, 21 (21/37, 56.8%) did not mention trial or review registration, but the remaining 16 (16/37, 43.2%) mentioned at least one of the two. Trial registration through ClinicalTrials.gov was mentioned by six (6/37, 16.2%) journals, whereas the WHO registry was mentioned by five (5/37, 13.5%). Sixteen (16/37, 43.2%) journals mentioned trial registration through a registry platform. CONCLUSION: Nearly half of the journals in our sample did not mention a reporting guideline, and only a small percentage of journals required the registration of clinical trials as a condition for publication. Implementing these two mechanisms may limit bias, and their adoption should be considered by journal editors in critical care. TRIAL REGISTRATION: UMIN000024081.

Clinical trial registry use in anaesthesiology systematic reviews: A cross-sectional study of systematic reviews published in anaesthesiology journals and the Cochrane Library.

BACKGROUND: Publication bias within systematic reviews may result in incorrect conclusions leading to inappropriate clinical decisions and a decreased quality of patient care. Searching clinical trial registries for unpublished studies is one possible solution to minimise publication bias. OBJECTIVES: To examine rates of clinical trial registry searches in systematic reviews published in respected anaesthesiology journals and whether these searches found trials (or data) eligible for inclusion; to compare rates of registry searches between published reviews and similar reviews within the Cochrane Anaesthesia, Critical and Emergency Care Group; to conduct trial registry searches for a subset of reviews, determining whether eligible studies were overlooked; to investigate whether reporting of results in completed anaesthesia trials on ClinicalTrials.gov followed guidelines. DESIGN: A cross-sectional study of systematic reviews published in 10 anaesthesiology journals and the Cochrane Library. SETTING AND PARTICIPANTS: PubMed and the Cochrane Library were searched for systematic reviews or meta-analyses. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The primary outcome was the number of systematic reviews that searched clinical trial registries for unpublished trials. Secondary outcomes included the number of registered trials in the ClinicalTrial.gov registry and the number of trials reporting trial results which were available on the ClinicalTrials.gov database and which should have been considered in a systematic review. RESULTS: The PubMed search yielded 507 records, and 415 remained after exclusions. Of these, 49 (11.8%) included a search of clinical trial registries. In total, 12 systematic reviews reported finding unpublished data but only five incorporated the data into their analyses. Of the Cochrane reviews, 58.9% (43/73) reported registry searches. Among a sample of 30 systematic reviews that omitted registry searches, we found many studies within the registries that were probably eligible to be included in the systematic reviews. For completed trials within the ClinicalTrials.gov database, only 15.4% reported results. CONCLUSION: The majority of systematic reviews in anaesthesiology did not include data from clinical trial registries. Exclusion of statistically nonsignificant data may lead to a biased interpretation of the data and hence inappropriate clinical interventions. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Registered in University hospital Medical Information Network (UMIN) Clinical Trials Registry (UMIN000021932).

Do emergency medicine journals promote trial registration and adherence to reporting guidelines? A survey of "Instructions for Authors".

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to evaluate the current state of two publication practices, reporting guidelines requirements and clinical trial registration requirements, by analyzing the "Instructions for Authors" of emergency medicine journals. METHODS: We performed a web-based data abstraction from the "Instructions for Authors" of the 27 Emergency Medicine journals catalogued in the Expanded Science Citation Index of the 2014 Journal Citation Reports and Google Scholar Metrics h5-index to identify whether each journal required, recommended, or made no mention of the following reporting guidelines: EQUATOR Network, ICMJE, ARRIVE, CARE, CONSORT, STARD, TRIPOD, CHEERS, MOOSE, STROBE, COREQ, SRQR, SQUIRE, PRISMA-P, SPIRIT, PRISMA, and QUOROM. We also extracted whether journals required or recommended trial registration. Authors were blinded to one another's ratings until completion of the data validation. Cross-tabulations and descriptive statistics were calculated using IBM SPSS 22. RESULTS: Of the 27 emergency medicine journals, 11 (11/27, 40.7%) did not mention a single guideline within their "Instructions for Authors," while the remaining 16 (16/27, 59.3%) mentioned one or more guidelines. The QUOROM statement and SRQR were not mentioned by any journals whereas the ICMJE guidelines (18/27, 66.7%) and CONSORT statement (15/27, 55.6%) were mentioned most often. Of the 27 emergency medicine journals, 15 (15/27, 55.6%) did not mention trial or review registration, while the remaining 12 (12/27, 44.4%) at least mentioned one of the two. Trial registration through ClinicalTrials.gov was mentioned by seven (7/27, 25.9%) journals while the WHO registry was mentioned by four (4/27, 14.8%). Twelve (12/27, 44.4%) journals mentioned trial registration through any registry platform. DISCUSSION: The aim of this study was to evaluate the current state of two publication practices, reporting guidelines requirements and clinical trial registration requirements, by analyzing the "Instructions for Authors" of emergency medicine journals. In this study, there was not a single reporting guideline mentioned in more than half of the journals. This undermines efforts of other journals to improve the completeness and transparency of research reporting. CONCLUSIONS: Reporting guidelines are infrequently required or recommended by emergency medicine journals. Furthermore, few require clinical trial registration. These two mechanisms may limit bias and should be considered for adoption by journal editors in emergency medicine. TRIAL REGISTRATION: UMIN000022486.