Best Practice Guidelines and Essential Methodological Steps to Conduct Rigorous and Systematic Meta‐Reviews

Hennessy, Emily A.; Johnson, Blair T.; Keenan, Ciara

doi:10.1111/aphw.12169

Cited by 55 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 61 publications

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“…As primary research as well as systematic reviews and meta‐analyses grow exponentially each year, the need to systematically synthesize the evidence‐base by conducting a meta‐review has grown as well (also known as an overview or review of reviews ; as argued elsewhere, the term “meta‐review” has the advantage of being relatively precise as the term literally means “review of reviews”; in contrast, “overview” could refer to a large number of possibilities) . Meta‐reviews can serve several purposes, including to compare and contrast the findings from systematic reviews and to provide a summary of the evidence and the quality of the evidence across these reviews . Along with the rapid growth of meta‐reviews, there are numerous methodological tools and considerations, many of which are still in the early phases of development or for which there are no established guidelines .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Overlap of the primary‐level studies in meta‐reviews is one such area for consideration and an important one for evidence synthesis methodologists because it concerns the potential for non‐independence in the primary studies across similar reviews. The extent to which systematic reviews in a particular domain include the same studies varies widely, depending on many factors . On the one hand, if reviews address similar questions with similar methods and integrate largely the same primary‐level studies' results, then their review conclusions should not differ.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Examining overlap of included studies in meta‐reviews: Guidance for using the corrected covered area index

Hennessy

Johnson

2019

Research Synthesis Methods

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Overlap in meta-reviews results from the use of multiple identical primary studies in similar reviews. It is an important area for research synthesists because overlap indicates the degree to which reviews address the same or different literatures of primary research. Current guidelines to address overlap suggest that assessing and documenting the degree of overlap in primary studies, calculated via the corrected covered area (CCA) is a promising method. Yet, the CCA is a simple percentage of overlap and current guidelines do not detail ways that reviewers can use the CCA as a diagnostic tool while also comprehensively incorporating these findings into their conclusions. Furthermore, we maintain that meta-review teams must address non-independence via overlap more thoroughly than by simply estimating and reporting the CCA. Instead, we recommend and elaborate five steps to take when examining overlap, illustrating these steps through the use of an empirical example of primary study overlap in a recently conducted meta-review. This work helps to show that overlap of primary studies included in a meta-review is not necessarily a bias but often can be a benefit. We also highlight further areas of caution in this task and potential for the development of new tools to address nonindependence issues. K E Y W O R D Scitation matrix, corrected covered area, meta-review, overlap, overview

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Examining overlap of included studies in meta‐reviews: Guidance for using the corrected covered area index

Hennessy

Johnson

2019

Research Synthesis Methods

Self Cite

140

121

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…As an emerging tool, meta-review can be an important method to summarize a broad and heterogeneous literature [9]. As some researchers have argued, "meta-reviews, which pull together existing synthesis literature, can have tremendous influence on research, practice, and policy; indeed, if conducted appropriately, synthesis literature is considered the strongest level of evidence, with meta-reviews atop the evidence pyramid" [10].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A comprehensive meta-review of systematic reviews and meta-analyses on nonpharmacological interventions for informal dementia caregivers

Cheng

Zhang

2020

BMC Geriatr

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Background: Many reviews with conflicting findings on dementia caregiver interventions have been published. A meta-review was conducted to synthesize the findings of systematic reviews and meta-analyses. Methods: MEDLINE, PsycINFO, CINAHL and Cochrane Library were searched to identify reviews published during 2006-2018. Results: Sixty reviews covering > 500 intervention studies were selected and appraised with Assessment of Multiple Systematic Reviews (AMSTAR) II. The great majority of studies were of low quality according to AMSTAR II, but quality factors appeared unrelated to the conclusions obtained. Depression was most modifiable, with effects found across a spectrum of interventions (psychoeducation, counseling/psychotherapy, occupational therapy, mindfulnessbased interventions, multicomponent interventions, etc.). Evidence of intervention effect was also found for quality of life (psychoeducation), mastery (psychoeducation, occupational therapy and multicomponent interventions) and communication skills (communication training). Null or weak results were found for anxiety, social support and burden. Support groups and respite were generally ineffective. There was no evidence that dyadic programs were better than caregiver-only programs, or that programs delivered individually or in groups would differ in their impacts. The evidence also does not support multicomponent interventions to have broader impacts than single-component programs. Methodological issues in the existing reviews (e.g., selective use of studies to serve different research purposes and inconsistent classification of interventions) were noted and taken into account when interpreting findings. (Continued on next page)Conclusions: This meta-review clarified variations in review methodology and identified a few potent groups of intervention (most notably psychoeducation, psychotherapy, occupational therapy, and multicomponent interventions), although no intervention type had broad effects on caregiver outcomes. We note that improvements are needed in the reporting of intervention studies and in making the classification of interventions more transparent and consistent. We further recommend fewer and larger-scale reviews and more attention to positive outcomes in order to better inform the field. Developing interventions with broader impacts and packaging them to meet caregivers' changing needs in the course of dementia should be a priority for researchers and practitioners.

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“…2). After deduplication 198 remained, and after screening abstracts and full text, seven were included [16][17][18][19][28][29][30]. One additional conference citation was found through expert knowledge on the topic [31], and one paper recently published was included after completion of the rst draft [32].…”

Section: Screening Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The authors found that when overviews contain overlapping primary studies, selecting a Cochrane systematic review, as opposed to the most recent or highest quality non-Cochrane review, maximized the amount of outcome data included in the overview [18]. Pollock [19,30] Murphy [23] Patnode [33] Select one (or more) reviews using prespeci ed eligibility criteria Ballard [28]; Hennessy [16,29]; Pollock [17];…”

Section: Characteristics Of Methods Studiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Managing Overlap of Primary Studies Results Across Systematic Reviews: Practical Considerations for Authors of Overviews of Reviews

Lunny

Pieper

Thabet

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Background: In overviews, inclusion of the same primary study in multiple systematic review gives undue weight to this study. Using a study result multiple times in the same analysis overstates its sample size and number of events, falsely leading to greater precision in the analysis. This paper aims to: (a) describe types of overlapping data that arise from the same primary studies reported across multiple reviews, (b) describe methods to identify and explain overlap of primary study data, and (c) present six case studies illustrating different approaches to manage overlap. Methods: We first updated the search in PubMed for methods from the MOoR framework relating to overlap of primary studies. One author screened the studies titles and abstracts, and any full-text articles retrieved, extracted methods data relating to overlap of primary studies and mapped it to the overlap methods from the MOoR framework. We also describe six case studies as examples of overviews that use specific methods across the steps in the conduct of an overview. For each case study, we discuss potential implications in terms of methodological limitations, efficiency, usability, and resource use.Results: Eight studies were mapped to the methods identified by the MOoR framework to address overlap. Several overlap methods mapped across four steps in the conduct of an overview – the eligibility criteria step, the data extraction step, the assessment of risk of bias step, and the synthesis step. Our overview case studies used multiple methods to reduce overlap at different steps in the conduct of an overview.Conclusions: Our study underlines that there is currently no standard methodological approach to deal with overlap in primary studies across reviews. The level of complexity when dealing with overlap can vary depending on the yield, trends and patterns of the included literature and the scope of the overview question. Choosing a method might be dependent on the number of included reviews and their primary studies. Gaps in in evaluation of methods to address overlap were found and further investigation in this area is needed.

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Best Practice Guidelines and Essential Methodological Steps to Conduct Rigorous and Systematic Meta‐Reviews

Cited by 55 publications

References 61 publications

Examining overlap of included studies in meta‐reviews: Guidance for using the corrected covered area index

Examining overlap of included studies in meta‐reviews: Guidance for using the corrected covered area index

A comprehensive meta-review of systematic reviews and meta-analyses on nonpharmacological interventions for informal dementia caregivers

Managing Overlap of Primary Studies Results Across Systematic Reviews: Practical Considerations for Authors of Overviews of Reviews

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