Cochrane handbook for systematic reviews of interventions

Description

"Systematic reviews summarise primary research. They are central to the evidence- based medicine movement and are widely acknowledged as the best form of evidence on which to base healthcare decisions. The Cochrane Collaboration exists to produce systematic reviews of healthcare treatments. To be reliable, systematic reviews should be conducted to the highest level of scientific rigour. This book enables Cochrane and other systematic review authors to do this and to ensure their review is of the highest quality and avoid methodological pitfalls"--  Read more... Abstract: "Systematic reviews summarise primary research. They are central to the evidence- based medicine movement and are widely acknowledged as the best form of evidence on which to base healthcare decisions. The Cochrane Collaboration exists to produce systematic reviews of healthcare treatments. To be reliable, systematic reviews should be conducted to the highest level of scientific rigour. This book enables Cochrane and other systematic review authors to do this and to ensure their review is of the highest quality and avoid methodological pitfalls" Content: Starting a review -- Determining the scope of the review and the questions it will address -- Defining the criteria for including studies and how they will be grouped for the synthesis -- Searching for and selecting studies -- Collecting data -- Choosing effect measures and computing estimates of effect -- Considering bias and conflicts of interest among the included studies -- Assessing risk of bias in a randomized trial -- Summarizing study characteristics and preparing for synthesis -- Analysing data and undertaking meta-analyses -- Undertaking network meta-analyses -- Synthesizing and presenting findings using other methods -- Assessing risk of bias due to missing results in a synthesis -- Completing 'Summary of findings' tables and grading the certainty of the evidence -- Interpreting results and drawing conclusions -- Equity and specific populations -- Intervention complexity -- Patient-reported outcomes -- Adverse effects -- Economics evidence -- Qualitative research and Cochrane Reviews -- Prospective approaches to accumulating evidence -- Including variants on randomized trials -- Including non-randomized studies on intervention effects -- Assessing risk of bias in a non-randomized study -- Individual participant data.