Trusting systematic reviews and meta-analyses: all that glitters is not gold!

Adam Weir · Safia Rabia · Clare L. Ardern

56 citations0/0 files storedBritish Journal of Sports Medicine

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Meta-analysis and systematic reviews Health Sciences Research and Education Clinical practice guidelines implementation

Abstract

Systematic reviews provide Level 1 evidence.They are firmly part of modern medical practice.Ideally, systematic reviews provide readers with comprehensive evidence summaries and can highlight research deficiencies.Busy clinicians welcome bite sized summaries to inform their practice.As part of BJSM's Education theme, we address the question 'Should I trust this systematic review?'. SYSTEMATIC REVIEWS ARE ONLY AS GOOD AS THE PAPERS THEY CONTAINMeta-analysis is the highest level of evidence, but the quality of any systematic review or meta-analysis is only as good as the studies identified and included.Summarising papers with a high risk of bias does not eliminate this bias.Pooling data (meta-analysis) from papers with a high risk of bias actually compounds the bias. 1 These basic facts are often underappreciated and overlooked.

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References

2007Development of AMSTAR: a measurement tool to assess the methodological quality of systematic reviews 2013Reporting and Methodological Quality of Systematic Reviews in the Orthopaedic Literature

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2019Identifying the ‘incredible’! Part 2: Spot the difference - a rigorous risk of bias assessment can alter the main findings of a systematic review 2019Identifying the ‘incredible’! Part 1: assessing the risk of bias in outcomes included in systematic reviews 2020Questions and answers about conducting systematic reviews in sport and exercise psychology 2019Protocol registration or development may benefit the design, conduct and reporting of dose-response meta-analysis: empirical evidence from a literature survey 2017Zombie reviews taking over the PROSPERO systematic review registry. It’s time to fight back!2021Nearly One‐Third of Published Systematic Reviews and Meta‐analyses Yield Inconclusive Conclusions: A Systematic Review 2019Should this systematic review and meta-analysis change my practice? Part 1: exploring treatment effect and trustworthiness

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