SynthesisAge and ageing2024
Assessment and report of individual symptoms in studies of delirium in postoperative populations: a systematic review.
Synthesis in Age and ageing, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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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
10 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 8 citations in OpenAlex.
- Effectiveness of drug interventions to prevent delirium after surgery for older adults: systematic review and network meta-analysis of randomised controlled trials.BMJ (Clinical research ed.) · 2026Pooled it
- "Pleasantly confused" and missed opportunities for delirium recognition: A hospital record audit.International journal of nursing studies advances · 2026Article
- Development and Expert Consensus of an Evidence-Based Strategy to Prevent Postoperative Delirium in Malnourished Cancer Patients.Journal of multidisciplinary healthcare · 2026Article
- The distinctive psychopathology of NMDAR-antibody encephalitis compared with primary psychoses: an international, multicentre, retrospective phenotypic analysis.The lancet. Psychiatry · 2026Article
- A nomogram and risk stratification for predicting subsyndromal delirium in elderly patients in a post-anaesthesia care unit: A prospective cohort study.International journal of nursing studies advances · 2025Article
- Assessing Delirium Vulnerability in Patients Referred to Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry Service: A Cross-Sectional Survey.Health science reports · 2025Article
- Identifying subphenotypes of patients undergoing post-operative delirium assessment.Alzheimer's & dementia : the journal of the Alzheimer's Association · 2025Observational
- Association between combinations of preoperative comorbidities and postoperative delirium in older patients: a matched cohort study.BMC anesthesiology · 2025Article
- Machine Learning-Based Identification of Preoperative Psychological Distress and Its Association With Adverse Surgery-Related Outcomes: Evidence From the China Surgery and Anesthesia Cohort (CSAC).Depression and anxiety · 2025Article
- Circadian disturbances, anxiety and motor disturbances differentiate delirium superimposed on dementia from dementia-only.Frontiers in psychiatry · 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
11 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectivesDelirium is most often reported as present or absent. Patients with symptoms falling short of the diagnostic criteria for delirium fall into 'no delirium' or 'control' groups. This binary classification neglects individual symptoms and may be hindering identification of the pathophysiology underlying delirium. This systematic review investigates which individual symptoms of delirium are reported by studies of postoperative delirium in adults.
methodsMedline, EMBASE and Web of Science databases were searched on 03 June 2021 and 06 April 2023. Two reviewers independently examined titles and abstracts. Each paper was screened in duplicate and conflicting decisions settled by consensus discussion. Data were extracted, qualitatively synthesised and narratively reported. All included studies were quality assessed.
resultsThese searches yielded 4,367 results. After title and abstract screening, 694 full-text studies were reviewed, and 62 deemed eligible for inclusion. This review details 11,377 patients including 2,049 patients with delirium. In total, 78 differently described delirium symptoms were reported. The most reported symptoms were inattention (N = 29), disorientation (N = 27), psychomotor agitation/retardation (N = 22), hallucination (N = 22) and memory impairment (N = 18). Notably, psychomotor agitation and hallucinations are not listed in the current Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders-5-Text Revision delirium definition.
conclusionsThe 78 symptoms reported in this systematic review cover domains of attention, awareness, disorientation and other cognitive changes. There is a lack of standardisation of terms, and many recorded symptoms are synonyms of each other. This systematic review provides a library of individual delirium symptoms, which may be used to inform future reporting.
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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.