Observational studyBMJ open2017
Publication of interventional phase 3 and 4 clinical trials in radiation oncology: an observational study.
Observational study in BMJ open, 2017. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper, 1 of them a synthesis 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
1 citing paper in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Time to publication for results of clinical trials.The Cochrane database of systematic reviews · 2024Pooled it
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesClinical trials produce the best data available for decision-making in modern evidence-based medicine. We aimed to determine the rate of non-publication of interventional phase 3 and 4 clinical trials involving patients with cancer undergoing radiotherapy.
settingThe ClinicalTrials.gov database was searched for interventional phase 3 and 4 trials in radiotherapy with a primary completion date before 1 January 2013. We determined how many of these registry entries have not published the compulsory deposition of their results in the database and performed a systematic search for published studies in peer-reviewed journals.
resultsOf 576 trials, 484 (84.0%) did not deposit a summary result in the registry. In addition, 44.9% of them did not publish their results in a peer-reviewed journal. Similar percentages were found for most cancer subtypes: brain (41%), breast (38%), cervical (66%), colorectal (38%), lung (48%), prostate (45%), bladder (56%), head and neck (56%) and lymphoma (33%).
conclusionOur results show that most trials in radiation oncology did not report the results in the registry. Almost half of these trials have not been published in the biomedical literature. This means that a large number of study participants were exposed to the risks of trial participation without the supposed benefits that sharing and publishing of results would offer to future generations of patients.
Indexed as
Identifiers
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.