4.6 Editorial Material

Meta-analyses of clinical trials: are we getting lemonade from lemons?

Journal

BRITISH JOURNAL OF ANAESTHESIA
Volume 128, Issue 2, Pages 233-235

Publisher

ELSEVIER SCI LTD
DOI: 10.1016/j.bja.2021.09.028

Keywords

anaesthesia; bias; clinical trial methodology; meta-analysis; outcomes; postoperative pulmonary complications; rigour

Categories

Funding

  1. US National Institutes of Health (NIH) [K23DA040923]
  2. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) [R01HS027795]

Ask authors/readers for more resources

Meta-analyses are important for guiding clinical trials and care, but they can be affected by methodologic problems and biases in the underlying trials. Publication bias often leads to overestimation of benefits in small trials, but this can be corrected by subsequent large trials. It is essential to conduct large, robust trials as they are irreplaceable by meta-analyses.
Meta-analyses guide planning of clinical trials and clinical care, but are subject to all the methodologic problems and potential biases present in the underlying trials. Furthermore, publication bias often contributes to overestimated benefit in meta-analyses of small trials, which are often 'corrected' by subsequent large trials. Meta-analyses are no substitute for large robust trials.

Authors

I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.

Reviews

Primary Rating

4.6
Not enough ratings

Secondary Ratings

Novelty
-
Significance
-
Scientific rigor
-
Rate this paper

Recommended

No Data Available
No Data Available