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Poster Therapeutic interventions of low back pain: a mega-analysis
van, Koes, Bouter
Introduction: In recent years, a number of meta-analyses of therapeutic modalities available for the treatment of low back pain (LBP) have been published by our research group and others. We systematically review the scientific literature to analyse the effectiveness of the various treatment…
Poster The identification of randomized controlled trials in nursing
Cullum
Introduction: Nursing is the largest professional work-force in the UK National Health Service, and nurses deliver most of the hands-on patient care in the UK and many other countries. It is essential therefore, that nurses are engaged in the drive to identify evidence-based health care, and that…
Poster Assessing trial quality by a short and a detailed list
Zaat, Assendelft, Mank
Introduction: Ranking trials according to their quality is a topic of discussion in literature and CRGs. So far only concealment of allocation has proven to be of influence on the results. Some plead for simple lists with attention only to concealment and randomization, while others use more…
Poster Handling multiple outcome measures
Hazell, O'Connel, Heathcote, Robertson, Henry
There is a great need for treatment outcome research in child and adolescent psychiatry, yet research to date has been of variable quality. Studies have been characterised by the use of small and heterogenous samples, and multiple outcome measures. Sample size is naturally addressed in meta-…
Poster The automatic identification of empirical research articles
Haas, Sugarman, Tibbo, Sugarman
Introduction: Retrieving documents from electronic databases on dimensions other than topic can be problematic, yet for many users this ability may be crucial in finding the documents they seek. For instance, distinguishing the empirical research literature from other types of literature on a…
Poster The quality of systematic reviews of treatments for obsessive compulsive disorder
Oakley-Browne
In preparation for a systematic review of randomised controlled trials of pharmacological and psychological treatments for obsessive compulsive disorder, previously published reviews, which included meta-analyses, were rated by quality features. Nine published and unpublished reviews were…
Poster Rating the methodological quality of randomised controlled trials
Sindhu
Introduction: A systematic review accumulates results from a number of independent studies. This raises the issue of potential variability in the methodological quality of studies to be accumulated. Although there has been an increase in the use of some form of quality rating by reviewers in the…
Poster Anaesthesiologic treatment for patients with chronic benign low back pain: a systematic review
de
This systematic review tries to answer the question whether anaesthesiologic pain relief is an effective treatment for patients with chronic benign low back pain. We therefore collected all randomized controlled trials on this subject (n=25), and after excluding the ones not meeting the inclusion…
Poster How systematic are reviews of health economics?
Rigby, Silagy, Crockett
Introduction: The lack of a systematic approach to preparing review articles has been demonstrated across a variety of medical disciplines. Review articles which focus on health economic issues, such as cost-effectiveness, rely heavily on synthesising information about resource utilisation as well…
Poster Hand-searching for studies other than randomised trials
Bero, Grimshaw, Hyde
Introduction: CCEPP (the Cochrane Collaboration on Effective Professional Practice) is reviewing the effects of educational, organizational and financial interventions on professional behaviour. The effects of these interventions cannot always be examined using randomized controlled trials.…
Poster Bias in case-control studies of screening effects
Flanders, Hosek, Sasco
Introduction: Screening programs are undertaken to reduce mortality and/or morbidity from chronic diseases such as cancer. Matched case-control studies have been used to assess the effectiveness of screening programs because of their relative simplicity and low cost. In such studies, the exposure…
Poster The appropriateness of abdominal aortic aneurysm surgery at twelve academic medical centers
Ballard, Ecthason
Introduction/Objective: To determine the appropriateness of use of abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) surgery in 12 U.S. academic medical centers.
Methods: Random sample of 1092 patients undergoing AAA surgery from 1987 to 1990 with retrospective medical review. Main outcome measures were the…
Poster The assessment of an electronic searching strategy with a Spanish medical journal
Lacalle, Fernandez, Polo, Moreno, Marin
Introduction/Objective: A searching strategy has been proposed in the Collaboration Handbook for locating published randomized clinical trials; this tool merits a proper evaluation in terms of sensitivity and specificity. The case of papers not published in English needs a particular assessment. In…
Poster Developing a critical appraisal skills programme for consumers
Milne, Oliver
Introduction: There is a growing enthusiasm amongst reviewers for involving consumers in the review process. Although consumer groups were eager to make use of systematic reviews when "Effective Care in Pregnancy and Childbirth" was first published, they need to develop their skills in…
Poster The quest for trials on the efficacy of human vaccines: results of the handsearch of the Vaccine journal
Jefferson
Introduction: Vaccines are one of the most widely used health technologies. It is estimated that 1479 million doses were used worldwide in 1990. Despite their wide acceptance, few population-based evaluations of their effectiveness have been carried out and evidence of their cost-effectiveness is…
Poster Search strategies for locating evaluations of health promotion initiatives
Fullerton, Oakley, Oliver, Peersman
Introduction: The move towards evidence-based health care through locating, reviewing and synthesizing the results of soundly designed evaluations of interventions needs to be paralleled by similar work in the field of health promotion initiatives. Identifying productive search strategies forms an…
Poster Collaboration to identify controlled trials in general health care journals in Europe
McDonald
Introduction: A major problem facing those preparing systematic reviews of the effects of health care is the difficulty in identifying all eligible studies. In a programme of activity coordinated by the Baltimore Cochrane Center, the Cochrane Collaboration is working with the US National Library of…
Poster The effect of calcium supplementation on bone loss in postmenopausal women
Shea, Wells, Cranney, Moher, Adachi, Treleaven, Peterson, Tugwell, Henry
Introduction: The risk of osteoporosis increases with age and is higher in women than in men. Osteoporosis among older women is a major health problem. The high prevalence of bone fractures among women with osteoporosis makes prevention of this disease important.
Objective: The purpose of this…
Poster Interventions for osteoporosis: a comparison of retrieval rates for RCTs using a broad labour-intensive search strategy, and Cochrane searching algorithms
Robertson, Shea, O'Connell, Henry, Mears, Wells, Tugwell, O'Connell
Introduction: The musculoskeletal group in the Cochrane Collaboration is carrying out a series of systematic reviews of the randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of interventions to prevent osteoporosis and osteoporotic fractures. The clinical epidemiology units at the Universities of Ottawa (CEUO)…
Poster "Weight of evidence" as an expression of clinical heterogeneity
Langhorne
Introduction: Clinical heterogeneity causes problems when trying to draw practical inferences from broadly inclusive systematic overviews of complex interventions. Conventional subgroup analysis may not completely address the needs of users of such overviews who frequently want to know how to…