SynthesisPloS one2022
Justification of research using systematic reviews continues to be inconsistent in clinical health science-A systematic review and meta-analysis of meta-research studies.
Synthesis in PloS one, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers, 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
4 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Evaluation of 'implications for research' statements in systematic reviews of interventions in advanced cancer patients - a meta-research study.BMC medical research methodology · 2023Pooled it
- Limited scientific coherence between global mental health research and indicators of science, health, mental health, and society: a longitudinal analysis across world regions.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- Back to the basics: Guidance for designing good literature searches.Research in social & administrative pharmacy : RSAP · 2024Article
- The use of systematic reviews for conducting new studies in physiotherapy research: a meta-research study comparing author guidelines of physiotherapy-related journals.Systematic reviews · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundRedundancy is an unethical, unscientific, and costly challenge in clinical health research. There is a high risk of redundancy when existing evidence is not used to justify the research question when a new study is initiated. Therefore, the aim of this study was to synthesize meta-research studies evaluating if and how authors of clinical health research studies use systematic reviews when initiating a new study.
methodsSeven electronic bibliographic databases were searched (final search June 2021). Meta-research studies assessing the use of systematic reviews when justifying new clinical health studies were included. Screening and data extraction were performed by two reviewers independently. The primary outcome was defined as the percentage of original studies within the included meta-research studies using systematic reviews of previous studies to justify a new study. Results were synthesized narratively and quantitatively using a random-effects meta-analysis. The protocol has been registered in Open Science Framework (https://osf.io/nw7ch/).
resultsTwenty-one meta-research studies were included, representing 3,621 original studies or protocols. Nineteen of the 21 studies were included in the meta-analysis. The included studies represented different disciplines and exhibited wide variability both in how the use of previous systematic reviews was assessed, and in how this was reported. The use of systematic reviews to justify new studies varied from 16% to 87%. The mean percentage of original studies using systematic reviews to justify their study was 42% (95% CI: 36% to 48%).
conclusionJustification of new studies in clinical health research using systematic reviews is highly variable, and fewer than half of new clinical studies in health science were justified using a systematic review. Research redundancy is a challenge for clinical health researchers, as well as for funders, ethics committees, and journals.
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.