ArticleKnee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA2021
"Only 50% of randomized trials have high level of confidence in arthroscopy and sports medicine"-a spin-based assessment.
Article in Knee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
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
3 citing papers in PubMed.
- Spin Bias in randomized controlled trials of botulinum toxin for bruxism management: a meta-epidemiologic study.BMC medical research methodology · 2025Article
- Mechanisms and Management of Knee Anterior Cruciate Ligament Injury; A Review.The archives of bone and joint surgery · 2025Review
- Analysis of Spin in RCTs of Spine Surgery Using ORG-LOC Grading Tool.Indian journal of orthopaedics · 2022Article
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
purposePioneering works on the quality appraisal of RCTs have recognized and addressed most of the issues that affect the RCT quality but some issues such as "Writers' bias" or "Spin" are yet to be sorted out. Spin, particularly in the abstracts, is a potential source of deception to the readers. The purpose of this study is to grade the RCTs of arthroscopy and sports medicine based on a spin in their abstracts, analyze the prevalence of spin, and explore methods to remove spin.
methods250 recent RCTs from the top 5 arthroscopy and sports medicine journals were selected. Baseline data of the articles were collected. Consort Adherence Score (CAS) was calculated. The abstracts of the RCTs were graded using the Level Of Confidence (LOC) grading tool developed by the Orthopaedic Research Group. The association of the spin grade with other characteristics of the articles was analyzed.
resultsThe median CAS for the included studies was 9 (IQR 8-10). It was found that only 49.6% (n = 124) articles had high LOC with no or one non-critical spin in the abstract. 20.8% (n = 52) had Moderate LOC with more than one non-critical spin. 19.6% (n = 49) had at least one critical spin and 10% (n = 25) had more than one critical flaw making their results have Low and Critically Low LOC, respectively. Of the ten variables analyzed in multivariate regression analysis, it was found that CAS was the only significant factor that determines the level of confidence in the abstract of RCTs
conclusionSpin is prevalent in abstracts of sports medicine and arthroscopy journals with 50.4% having some form of spin. Grading the LOC of the RCTs based on spin is the necessity of the day for the readers. Only 49.6% of the RCTs had high LOC. Objective structuring of the abstracts would help eliminate spin in the future. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Level 1.
Indexed as
Identifiers
34021767What 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.