ArticleJournal of epidemiology and community health2005
Systematic reviews of health effects of social interventions: 2. Best available evidence: how low should you go?
Article in Journal of epidemiology and community health, 2005. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 58 papers, 17 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
58 citing papers in PubMed, 17 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- A systematic review of qualitative research exploring resilience in Academia.International journal of qualitative studies on health and well-being · 2026Pooled it
- Assessing the effects of population-level political, economic and social exposures, interventions and policies on inclusive economy outcomes for health equity in high-income countries: a systematic review of reviews.Systematic reviews · 2024Pooled it
- Title: Can changing the physical environment promote walking and cycling? A systematic review of what works and how.Health & place · 2019Pooled it
- Choosing Channels, Sources, and Content for Communicating Prostate Cancer Information to Black Men: A Systematic Review of the Literature.American journal of men's health · 2018Pooled it
- Welfare-to-work interventions and their effects on the mental and physical health of lone parents and their children.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2018Pooled it
- A comparison of results of empirical studies of supplementary search techniques and recommendations in review methodology handbooks: a methodological review.Systematic reviews · 2017Pooled it
- Welfare-to-work interventions and their effects on the mental and physical health of lone parents and their children.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2017Pooled it
- Barriers and Facilitators to Integrating Health Service Responses to Intimate Partner Violence in Low- and Middle-Income Countries: A Comparative Health Systems and Service Analysis.Studies in family planning · 2017Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Food supplementation for improving the physical and psychosocial health of socio-economically disadvantaged children aged three months to five years.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2015Pooled it
- Using multiple types of studies in systematic reviews of health care interventions--a systematic review.PloS one · 2013Pooled it
- Assessing the social and physical determinants of circumpolar population health.International journal of circumpolar health · 2013Pooled it
- Interventions targeting social isolation in older people: a systematic review.BMC public health · 2011Pooled it
- Depressive symptoms and their social contexts: a qualitative systematic literature review of contextual interventions.The International journal of social psychiatry · 2011Pooled it
- The psychosocial and health effects of workplace reorganisation. 1. A systematic review of organisational-level interventions that aim to increase employee control.Journal of epidemiology and community health · 2007Pooled it
- A systematic review of the health, social and financial impacts of welfare rights advice delivered in healthcare settings.BMC public health · 2006Pooled it
- Social Interventions Targeting Social Relations Among Older People at Nursing Homes: A Qualitative Synthesized Systematic Review.Inquiry : a journal of medical care organization, provision and financingPooled it
- Applying a complex systems-informed approach to population health interventions: a methodological case-study example of traffic restriction schemes outside schools.BMC public health · 2026Article
- Using administrative data to evaluate national policy impacts on child and maternal health: a research framework from the Maternal and Child Health Network (MatCHNet).Journal of epidemiology and community health · 2023Article
- Identifying opportunities for upstream evaluations relevant to child and maternal health: a UK policy-mapping review.Archives of disease in childhood · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
STUDY
objectiveThere is little guidance on how to select the best available evidence of health effects of social interventions. The aim of this paper was to assess the implications of setting particular inclusion criteria for evidence synthesis.
designAnalysis of all relevant studies for one systematic review, followed by sensitivity analysis of the effects of selecting studies based on a two dimensional hierarchy of study design and study population.
settingCase study of a systematic review of the effectiveness of interventions in promoting a population shift from using cars towards walking and cycling. MAIN
resultsThe distribution of available evidence was skewed. Population level interventions were less likely than individual level interventions to have been studied using the most rigorous study designs; nearly all of the population level evidence would have been missed if only randomised controlled trials had been included. Examining the studies that were excluded did not change the overall conclusions about effectiveness, but did identify additional categories of intervention such as health walks and parking charges that merit further research, and provided evidence to challenge assumptions about the actual effects of progressive urban transport policies.
conclusionsUnthinking adherence to a hierarchy of study design as a means of selecting studies may reduce the value of evidence synthesis and reinforce an "inverse evidence law" whereby the least is known about the effects of interventions most likely to influence whole populations. Producing generalisable estimates of effect sizes is only one possible objective of evidence synthesis. Mapping the available evidence and uncertainty about effects may also be important.
Indexed as
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What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.