SynthesisNature communications2021
Methodological quality of COVID-19 clinical research.
Synthesis in Nature communications, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 84 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
84 citing papers in PubMed, 17 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- VEGF-A in COVID-19: a systematic review and meta-analytical approach to its prognostic value.Clinical and experimental medicine · 2025Pooled it
- Interventions to build resilience and to ameliorate negative psychosocial effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on children and adolescents: a systematic review and meta-analysis.European child & adolescent psychiatry · 2024Pooled it
- Pooled it
- Identifying patterns of reported findings on long-term cardiac complications of COVID-19: a systematic review and meta-analysis.BMC medicine · 2023Pooled it
- Neuropsychological deficits in patients with persistent COVID-19 symptoms: a systematic review and meta-analysis.Scientific reports · 2023Pooled it
- The impact of COVID-19 on the mental health workforce: A rapid review.International journal of mental health nursing · 2023Pooled it
- COVID-19-related changes in eating disorder pathology, emotional and binge eating and need for care: a systematic review with frequentist and Bayesian meta-analyses.Eating and weight disorders : EWD · 2023Pooled it
- Alzheimer's early detection in post-acute COVID-19 syndrome: a systematic review and expert consensus on preclinical assessments.Frontiers in aging neuroscience · 2023Pooled it
- Efficacy of tocilizumab in the treatment of COVID-19: An umbrella review.Reviews in medical virology · 2022Pooled it
- Randomized controlled trials in patients with COVID-19: a systematic review and critical appraisal.International journal of infectious diseases : IJID : official publication of the International Society for Infectious Diseases · 2022Pooled it
- The collateral damage of COVID-19 to cardiovascular services: a meta-analysis.European heart journal · 2022Pooled it
- Identifying factors contributing to increased susceptibility to COVID-19 risk: a systematic review of Mendelian randomization studies.International journal of epidemiology · 2022Pooled it
- COVID-19 pandemic effects on health worker's mental health: Systematic review and meta-analysis.European psychiatry : the journal of the Association of European Psychiatrists · 2022Pooled it
- Potential limitations in systematic review studies assessing the effect of the main intervention for treatment/therapy of COVID-19 patients: An overview.Frontiers in medicine · 2022Pooled it
- The impacts of COVID-19 on eating disorders and disordered eating: A mixed studies systematic review and implications.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Pooled it
- Tocilizumab administration for the treatment of hospitalized patients with COVID-19: A systematic review and meta-analysis.Respirology (Carlton, Vic.) · 2021Pooled it
- Adherence with reporting of ethical standards in COVID-19 human studies: a rapid review.BMC medical ethics · 2021Pooled it
- Diagnostic accuracy of non-invasive SARS-CoV-2 screening tests: a national prospective analysis.BMC infectious diseases · 2025Trial
- Quantifying selection bias due to unobserved patients in pharmacoepidemiologic studies of severe COVID-19 cohorts.BMC medical research methodology · 2026Article
- Artificial Intelligence in Detecting Statistical Errors: Implications for Authors, Reviewers, and Editors.Journal of Korean medical science · 2025Review
24 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
11 authors.
Funding
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic began in early 2020 with major health consequences. While a need to disseminate information to the medical community and general public was paramount, concerns have been raised regarding the scientific rigor in published reports. We performed a systematic review to evaluate the methodological quality of currently available COVID-19 studies compared to historical controls. A total of 9895 titles and abstracts were screened and 686 COVID-19 articles were included in the final analysis. Comparative analysis of COVID-19 to historical articles reveals a shorter time to acceptance (13.0[IQR, 5.0-25.0] days vs. 110.0[IQR, 71.0-156.0] days in COVID-19 and control articles, respectively; p < 0.0001). Furthermore, methodological quality scores are lower in COVID-19 articles across all study designs. COVID-19 clinical studies have a shorter time to publication and have lower methodological quality scores than control studies in the same journal. These studies should be revisited with the emergence of stronger evidence.
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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.