Journal
AGE AND AGEING
Volume 46, Issue 5, Pages 722-728Publisher
OXFORD UNIV PRESS
DOI: 10.1093/ageing/afx105
Keywords
systematic review; meta-analysis; methodology; older people
Categories
Funding
- Alzheimer Scotland
- University of Edinburgh Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology
- cross council Lifelong Health and Wellbeing Initiative [MR/L501530/1]
- Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)
- Medical Research Council (MRC)
- MRC Clinical Research Training Fellowship [MR/P001823/1]
- NIHR Integrated Academic Training Programme
- MRC [MR/P001823/1] Funding Source: UKRI
- Medical Research Council [MR/P001823/1, MR/K026992/1] Funding Source: researchfish
- National Institute for Health Research [ACF-2012-11-503] Funding Source: researchfish
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Systematic reviews and meta-analyses are increasingly common. This article aims to provide guidance for people conducting systematic reviews relevant to the healthcare of older people. An awareness of these issues will also help people reading systematic reviews to determine whether the results will influence their clinical practice. It is essential that systematic reviews are performed by a team which includes the required technical and clinical expertise. Those performing reviews for the first time should ensure they have appropriate training and support. They must be planned and performed in a transparent and methodologically robust way: guidelines are available. The protocol should be written-and if possible published-before starting the review. Geriatricians will be interested in a table of baseline characteristics, which will help to determine if the studied samples or populations are similar to their patients. Reviews of studies of older people should consider how they will manage issues such as different age cut-offs; non-specific presentations; multiple predictors and outcomes; potential biases and confounders. Systematic reviews and meta-analyses may provide evidence to improve older people's care, or determine where new evidence is required. Newer methodologies, such as meta-analyses of individual level data, network meta-analyses and umbrella reviews, and realist synthesis, may improve the reliability and clinical utility of systematic reviews.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available